Fairfax City, VA — The Fairfax City Council met yesterday to discuss the potential adoption of ranked choice voting (RCV) in future Council elections. The City Registrar, Wannicha Rojanapradith, reported that technical limitations of the City's current voting equipment will delay RCV adoption until at least 2026.
In some states, state regulators require that all local jurisdictions use the same vendor and model of voting equipment. In Virginia, each locality purchases voting equipment from a vendor of its choosing. The City of Fairfax uses Unisyn voting systems, which currently allow only three ranking columns on ballots. Since Fairfax elects all six council members in every election, this technical constraint poses a significant challenge to implementing ranked choice voting. Ranked choice elections require that ballots have at least as many rankings available as seats being filled so that voters can fully participate in selecting all the open positions.
Mayor Read noted that the other Virginia localities that have adopted RCV, Arlington and Charlottesville, have faced fewer technical hurdles because they elect fewer seats at a time. The two states that use RCV statewide, Maine and Alaska, have avoided similar challenges by purchasing their voting systems from vendors other than Unisyn. Unisyn is currently developing software updates to support more rankings and anticipates completion by 2026, at which point the Council may revisit ranked choice adoption.
In the interim, Mayor Read expressed interest in transitioning the Council to staggered terms so that only three council seats would be up for election each cycle. If the City were to adopt staggered terms, RCV could be possible using existing equipment since fewer rankings would be needed per ballot. Council will resume discussing staggered terms in 2025, when the newly-elected council members take office.
