After watching the recent online council forum, it is clear that electing Kaua‘i councilmembers by district is a change that is long overdue.
While there were over a dozen good souls at this forum seeking to demonstrate their worthiness to voters, in the present “at-large” system there is simply no way to choose or compare one against the other. There is no direct debate of ideas or solutions, but rather just a seemingly endless parade of generalities without rebuttal.
The present, “at-large” system does not allow voters to truly choose who will represent them and the issues most important to them and their districts. Voters in individual districts deserve to be able to call upon the person specifically elected to represent the needs of that district. Yes, the councilmember elected from a certain district must also represent the whole of the county, but the current system doesn’t ensure each district has an equal voice.
The system now in place is also not fair to candidates, especially new candidates. Incumbents already have a huge advantage, and for new candidates who have to build county-wide name recognition, the cost and effort is extraordinarily high. Candidates who have fresh ideas and bold proposals are stifled in the beauty-pageant-style forums that review over 20 candidates at a time, giving each one to three minutes to present complex answers to complex issues.
There are never just two people on stage, an incumbent and a challenger, discussing competing ideas and solutions. Voters never get to see any meaningful direct comparison of the candidates. And new candidates are never given a public opportunity to challenge incumbents one-on-one.
In addition, because of the widespread practice of “plunking,” or utilizing only one or two of the “up to seven votes” each voter is allowed, the system is skewed and does not provide each candidate an equal or fair opportunity to be elected.
A quick lesson on the principle of “plunking:” Imagine for a moment that you are a candidate for the Kaua‘i County Council. Now imagine your mother and father in the voting booth. They each, of course, cast their first vote for you, and then they cast their remaining six votes for other candidates. Imagine seeing the results come in and realizing you lost by a single vote and the other six candidates mom and dad voted for won.
Your parents’ votes for the other six candidates were the votes that beat you. If good ole mom and dad would have only voted for you and no one else, you would have won. This is why akamai candidates educate their families and close friends on how “plunking” works. If a candidate has 50 people “plunk” only for them, that is taking away 50 votes from six other candidates, giving the favored “plunked” candidate a 50-vote advantage.
Kauai is the only county that does not have some form of district voting, and it’s time, I believe, to put the question once again on the ballot for voters to decide. There are different models and ways to enact “districting,” and it’s possible to incorporate elements and benefits of both the existing “at-large” system and a conventional “districting” system.
Putting a “multimember, three-district” option on the ballot would be a good step in the right direction. Utilizing the three existing state House districts and electing councilmembers from within those districts would avoid the expense and complexity of “redrawing district lines,” and provide residents within those districts the benefit on being represented by councilmembers who actually experience and understand the issues associated with that district.
While a multimember, three-district system will not eliminate all of the challenges involved with a strictly “at-large” system, it will in fact greatly improve upon the status quo, and in fact allow residents the opportunity to vote for and be represented by someone who actually lives in their neighborhood.
The Kaua‘i County Council will be discussing this issue at their meeting today — agenda item COW2020-04. Readers, residents and voters are encouraged to offer testimony via counciltestimony@kauai.gov and/or share thoughts when feasible with all seven councilmember’s at councilmembers@kauai.gov.
Please, take the time and engage this issue with your Kaua‘i County Council. They have the power to place this question on the ballot for voters to decide. That is all that is being asked of them. They do not have to endorse or even support the idea. The only ask is that they give individual voters the courtesy to decide for themselves whether they would like to change the system or not.
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Gary Hooser formerly served in the state Senate, where he was majority leader. He also served for eight years on the Kaua‘i County Council, and was the former director of the state Office of Environmental Quality Control. He serves presently in a volunteer capacity as board president of the Hawai‘i Alliance for Progressive Action and is executive director of the Pono Hawai‘i Initiative.
Hooser has repeatedly advocated for voting systems which entrench the Democrat power-elite and work strongly against everyone whose views are different.
Hooser pushed hard for all-mail voting, abolishing the polling places where people can personally safeguard their ballots and make sure they go directly into the ballot-counting machine. All-mail voting allows vote-harvesting, where party honchos and union bosses can demand the people they control to attend mass meetings where they must bring their ballots and cast votes while the big-shots watch over them. It allows Dem bosses to go into communal meetings at nursing homes and assisted living centers, and door-to-door to the homes of frail elders or immigrants with limited English, to “help” them fill out their ballots “correctly” and then grab those ballots and mail them. It allows someone to buy votes successfully because the buyer can personally watch the voter fill out his ballot and then seal it and mail it for him; no privacy of the “secret ballot” in the voting booth where a voter who took the bribe can nevertheless vote however he chooses.
Then Hooser pushed for “ranked-choice” voting where there is no run-off final election between the two top vote-getters in a primary — the voter doesn’t get to see direct debate between the two final candidates; so a voter’s choice is already made at an early stage when his own preferences are unclear and the “machine” is at its greatest effectiveness. His vote gets simply tossed in the trash if he did not vote for one of the finalists.
Now Hooser wants to further disempower a voter with strongly-held views and a strong preference for one candidate by diminishing or even taking away his right to “plunk.” Under the present system such a voter can give one vote to his favored candidate and give no votes at all to anyone else, thereby magnifying the effectiveness of that vote. Here’s what I favor, which Hooser would hate because it empowers individual voters with minority views: cumulative voting. If there are 7 positions to be filled and however many additional candidates, then each voter gets 7 votes which can be distributed however the voter chooses — including casting 4 votes for his most-favored candidate and 3 votes for his next-most-favored, or even casting all 7 votes for the single candidate the voter most strongly supports. That would be greatly magnified “plunking”; and gives outsize power to minority voters to elect minority candidates; so Hooser would greatly fear it as being disruptive to the Democrat-elite’s hold on power.
This is Total BS. Any political debate, even among only two candidates usually degenerates into “generalities”. Dividing into districts will just create personal Fiefdoms. Then you get vote trading among the council member – “vote for the expensive project in my district and I will vote for the expensive project in your district”. Keep the voting island wide and make the council members work for the entire island.
The main problem I see with district-based elections is that we might end up following the pattern of the US Senate–where every district, no matter what its population, has the same number of representatives. This totally violates the ideal of equal representation for each person.
I’m with you Gary. The current system insures victories for a handful of families (the good old boys) and results in nothing ever changing. Sometimes this can be a good thing as it slows development, but more often it results potholed roads, and poorly maintained parks. Enough!