Instant Runoff Voting V. Range Voting

Instant Runoff Voting (By Hand, of Course. It CAN Be Done):

I think that IRV is a fabulous goal, long term. It stands to greatly reduce runoff costs and other problems once we have systems that can reliably handle it. The problem right now is that our electronic voting systems cannot reliably count straight races, and even the DRE manufacturers have said that they are not ready for IRV.

Complicating things, IRV introduces a more confusing system in terms of auditability and security, since the ballots are more complex and normal indicators such as exit polls will not be able to easily reflect IRV results.

Tracing back the will of the voter in the event of problems or fraud would be more difficult with IRV until a reliable procedure and design is in place, and any abuses are much less likely to be detected since the whole point of the IRV system is avoiding recounts.

That's not to say that it can't be done, just that it is extremely important to get it right the first time, with proper design and certification.
Instant Runoff Voting is a great goal for us to work toward, but if we need to get a system in place for 2006 and 2008, IRV is not logistically viable. For IRV to work, we need systems that are trustworthy and reliable, and that takes more time and money than we have available before the next election.

An analogy I use for IRV is the flying car - definitely possible, and a great idea, but right now we won't get there by strapping a missile to a Yugo. Would it fly? Sure - but I don't think it's what we want to rely on for safe and reliable transportation.
I would be happy to work with you towards IRV as a long-term goal, as I think it has merit as a long-term solution when properly designed and tested.
http://www.chuckherrin.com/sinceyouasked.htm

IRV voting would complicate achieving election integrity – Kathy Dopp

Until transparent, verifiable, sufficient manual audits of electronic vote counts are obtained in
every state to ensure the integrity of outcomes (and these exist in no states yet)
IRV voting will create big obstacles to detecting any outcome-altering vote miscount
using statistical methods; and therefore leave our elections open to undetectable vote fraud.

In addition, IRV can put a person in office that is not wanted by a majority of voters.
There are other methods that are probably better. See this page:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Instant-runoff_voting#Practical_implications

… Much more mathematical analysis is needed before IRV is implemented and its
implementation must wait until after the integrity of our democratic elections is assured,
if we want the voters to determine who wins office."
Please see:
http://electionarchive.org/ucvInfo/US/EI-FederalLegislationProposal.pdf

This comment by Kathy Dopp can be found in the comments section at this link
http://www.opednews.com/articles/genera_steven_h_061215_new_voting_method_to.htm

Instant Runoff Voting Not Meeting Expectations
by John Dunbar‚ Nov. 17‚ 2005

It's noteworthy that the Green Party which has long supported ranked choice voting
so that there could be oxygen in the American electoral system for their politics failed
to make a single endorsement, much less three for Treasurer, Assessor and City Attorney.
Non was the operative ranking principle....

So far under IRV we have incumbents getting well below 50 percent and even into the low 30 percent range on the first pass being re-elected under IRV. A frontrunner in a supervisor contest was successful with under 30 percent support in the first pass...

How good a job is IRV doing in terms of producing democratic outcomes with the greatest number of voters? In 2004, no supervisor in a contested race triggering ranked choice voting won a majority of the total votes cast in their districts.
In multiple candidate races, supervisors were elected who received well under 40 percent of the total votes cast....

IRV is simply a voting system. It gives the electorate a new set of tools, but it asks an enormous amount of voters, news organizations and endorsement groups.
The jury on this San Francisco experiment is still out, but IRV to date falls short of its backers expectations.

http://www.beyondchron.org/news/index.php?itemid=1468