St. Louis Business Journal: “Drebes: Crowded field, ballot measure impact St. Louis mayor's race”

“In November, city voters will find Proposition D on their ballots. If approved, it would make three key changes to the voting process.

First, it would make St. Louis’ municipal elections nonpartisan. Candidates would no longer be affiliated with political parties. In some respect, this wouldn’t be an enormous change for the city, where Democratic dominance has already eliminated the normal Democrat versus Republican narrative.

Second, it would implement ‘approval voting.’ Voters would no longer be restricted to simply voting for one candidate. Approval voting means that you vote for every candidate that you like. If there are five people running for mayor, and you think they would all be fine at the job, you can vote for all five. Or just four. Or only one. The result is that candidates who share a base of support won’t see their base splintered. For example, two very liberal candidates can both win all the liberal votes.

The approval voting would happen in March as the primary election. And then the following month, when the city would normally hold its general election, the top two vote-getters would hold a runoff election to determine the ultimate winner.”

Read the full story on its original platform here.