Rank MI Vote, the group hoping to put a constitutional amendment on the ballot implementing ranked choice voting in the state, is beginning a series of 40 town halls in an effort to educate voters and gain feedback on its proposal. The group is set for a town hall from 3-5 p.m. Saturday, Nov. 2, at the Brighton District Library, 100 Library Drive.
The group currently has two differently worded options for the proposal, which it will put in front of volunteers and the public during its town halls and subsequent policy discussions in the last quarter of the year, Ron Zimmerman, executive director of Rank MI Vote, told reporters during a call on Monday.
Zimmerman said the group is looking at kicking off signature collections sometime in April 2025.
“We want to spend the final quarter of (2024) getting a lot of input from a lot of places: focus groups, town halls, so on and so forth, on the various options that we have,” he said. “Then the first quarter of next year, leading up to the petition drive would be all about now paying, you know, some of the top lawyers in Michigan, who ho supported language for other constitutional amendments to take those drafts and make them airtight. Pressure test them, you know, put them … through the scenarios of how it could be challenged and so on and so forth.”
Rank MI Vote has brought on Katie Fahey, who spearheaded the Voters Not Politicians ballot drive that eventually led to the Independent Citizens Redistricting Commission .
“Voters are choosing the fastest-growing democracy reform in the U.S., Ranked Choice Voting, to find problem-solving elected officials, not politicians who value partisan gridlock over the needs of voters,” Fahey said in a statement.
Other scheduled town halls can be found on the group’s website.
– By Alethia Kasben
