The World According to Oatney

First-Past-the-Post

People in Jefferson County talk about the need for changing how our county commission works, but maybe we should just change the way they are elected:

Our present system is not really first-past-the-post, but is first-and-second-(and in district three third)-past-the-post. All of our commission seats ought to be elected on a singular first-past-the-post basis, in other words, in separate elections where the person who gets the most votes wins, and the others go to the house. Such a system wouldn't make the ballot all that much longer, it would just mean that each seat on the commission would be separately elected, and it would make our candidates work harder, because now finishing second would not be good enough, they would have to finish at the top of the heap.

Labels: Elections, Local politics, Tennessee politics

posted by Deacon David Oatney @ 11:10 AM