Surplus Ballots

CitySource Campaign95

What's a Surplus Ballot and Who Gets It?

The Surplus Scenario

You mark your favorite candidate #1 on your Council ballot.
Your # candidate gets more #1 votes than he or she needs.
Your candidate has a surplus.
That surplus number of votes will be transferred to other candidates.
Your ballot may stay in your #1's pile or it may go to your#2?

Where your ballot goes

That depends order of counting and the size of your candidate's surplus.

Ballots are sorted, numbered, and counted one precinct at a time. The order of precincts counted is random and determined by lot the week before the election.

One by one the total ballots from each precinct are separated into piles of #1 votes by candidate.

There's a Method

Surplus votes get transferred to second choice candidates according to the "Cincinnati" Procedure*. The procedure, which randomly distributes the ballots, is designed to give equal weight to all areas of the City. Each of a candidate's #1 votes is numbered "as they come, consesecutively (1,2,3,4, etc.)" by precinct.

An Example: Surplus ballots in the 93 Council Election

Here's how the Cincinnati procedure worked in 93:

In the 1993 Council election, only Ken Reeves had more # 1 votes than he needed to be elected. (On the School Committee side Henrietta Davis and David Maher had a"surplus" of #1 votes, more than the 3001 required (just over 14 % of the votes). Reeves received 2755 # 1 votes, a surplus of 573 over the 2182 (10%) required for election. All Reeves' #1 votes were numbered: 1 to 2755, precinct by precinct in the order determined by lot. .

To select which 573 of the Reeve's total #1 votes would be counted as surplus, the election commission calculated the proportion of Reeve's votes that were surplus. They did this by dividing his total #1 votes (2755) by his surplus (573). The result, 4.8, was rounded to the next whole number, 5. Thus, approximately one of every 5th #1 vote for Reeves was a surplus vote.

Next, every 5th ballot by number (Reeves' ballot #1,5,10,15, etc.) in Ken Reeve's #1 pile was transfered to the candidates ranked #2 on those surplus ballots. Of Reeve's surplus, the largest number (110) went to Jonathan Myers, followed by Ed Cyr (87) and Katherine Triantafillou (76)

This redistribution of "winners' votes in excess of quota is designed, supporters say, to give the balance of power to the majority of voters while maintaining minority representation.

*The Cincinnati procedure is named for the 1949 amendments to the Charter of the City of Cincinnati. The procedures were proposed by a super majority of the City Council and the Mayor and approved by the voters on Nov 8, 1949. It took effect on January 1, 1950.

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