IRV is on the Oakland Ballot!

Hello Oakland Greens and Other Progressives,

It was close to 2:00 a.m. this morning when six of eight Oakland City
Councilmembers voted to place Oakland IRV, with the compromise of
removing the required date of implementation, on the November ballot.

The six in favor were sponsors Nancy Nadel and Pat Kernighan, early
supporters Jean Quan and Desley Brooks, and later supporters Jane
Brunner and Ignacio De La Fuente. Opposed were Henry Chang and Larry
Reid.

What's next?

FIRST, of course, IRV needs to win in November!

SECOND, after it wins the voters' support, IRV needs to be implemented,
without the significant assistance of a required date. History has
shown that implementation can be greatly affected by whether or not
there is a "date certain", for example 2008 or 2010. San Francisco had
a required date; San Leandro, Berkeley, and now Oakland, do not. On the
other hand, the Alameda County Registrar of Voters has a contract with
Sequoia voting systems which states that they will be IRV-ready by
2007, a year before Oakland's 2008 municipal elections.

It's time to celebrate . . . take a breath . . . get it passed . . .
and get it implemented!

Winning in November will take a lot of people-power! We look forward to
joining together on this effort, and we'll be in touch soon about
setting up a meeting to plan our campaign.

Thank you so much for your vision and on-the-ground support. Lots of
Greens were part of this, and I very much expect that the 5th and 6th
councilmembers' "yes" votes were greatly influenced by our calls and
emails and media and showing up at the 1-2-3-4-FIVE meetings!

Laura Wells
for the Oakland IRV group
http://www.OaklandIRV.org
info [at] OaklandIRV.org

Laura Wells for Controller
PO Box 16025
Oakland, CA 94610
(510) 986-0879 - FPPC# 1283378
http://www.laurawells.org
--Green Party Candidate for State Controller--