2008.05.13 Energy!

The transition to a local, renewable energy economy is happening in
Santa Fe right now in a deep and meaningful way: County commissioner
Paul Campos and City councilor Chris Calvert have drawn up a joint
resolution to fund a study on the feasibility of a municipally owned
electric grid that would be based totally on renewable energy. This
would be a grounbreaking and landmark decision, not only in New Mexico,
but the country in general.

The first challenge will obviously be PNM who will stand to lose
millions of dollars in revenue and will undoudtedly be working all their
angles to derail the deal. (A successful renewable grid will also mean
the end of coal fired power plants, but that's another story.) The second
challenge will be bringing the commissioners and councilors onboard as
they will have to vote to implement and will have to feel confident in
their position. The third challenge will be our dear local media who can
kill an initiative with bad data or bad reporting or both - we all know
that drill. Having said that, I feel we have a lot of positive support
from both the New Mexican and the Reporter and certainly the smaller
papers and public radio. Again, this will be a long haul and letters to
the editor, etc. will be very important. The fourth challenge will be the
business community and here I feel the outreach can be of great benefit
as a locally owned grid, based on renewables, will have a huge positive
impact on the local economy, both immediately and over time. The
educational component with both the business community and the community
at large will be a wonderful opportunity for more organizing and
outreach.

This move away from centralized fossil fuel energy toward local renewable
energy is in a deep sense a political one. This is where the Greens among
us will have an important role to play. Basically this is a transition to
a democratic - small "d" economy. Along with IRV and all the other Green
value based political reforms, this will bring more coherent structure to
our local democracy. As we head into crises of peak fossil fuel, climate
disruption, water shortages, economic melt down, and a corporate assault
on all the last drops of profit within our local communities, survival
will depend on strong, coherent, democratic local structures. I see the
transition to local energy in all its forms as key and the underpinning
of local food production, green building, and the growing local democracy
movement. The coming County elections are critical and we will need to
begin holding indepth candidate forums soon. We have our work cut out for
us and I know the Green Party's participation will be critical. We've
won important battles already, and we can keep right on winning even bigger battles in these critical times.

Consider this an appetizer. I'll follow up with articles on the
specifics of a renewable energy based municipal grid - very exciting - and the battle against
oil/gas drilling. It's wonderful to see what a few committed people with
vision have done. It will be more and more wondeful to see what they (we)
can do as our survival becomes literally dependent upon it.

2008.03.25

IRV: Instant Runoff Voting

RANKED CHOICE VOTING  aka instant runoff voting.

The Santa Fe Charter Review Commission (with support from local Greens) worked diligently to come up with seven amendments to the City Charter, and the city council unanimously sent them forward to be on the ballot on March 4th, 2008. The amendments will bring a more democratic and more accountable city government, and voters are encouraged to vote in support of all seven of them.

One of the amendments is Ranked Choice Voting (RCV), also known as Instant Runoff Voting (IRV), which is a simple to use, full-choice voting system whereby when three or more candidates run for a single seat, voters are allowed to rank the candidates in order of preference, 1-2-3, etc., rather than simply choose one favorite (or not so favorite!) candidate.

RCV eliminates the "spoiler" problem in which a candidate who cannot win him or herself gets enough votes to throw the election to some other candidate who is favored by a minority.

RCV has been shown to increase voter turnout, since voters are allowed to express their complete set of preferences and thus feel empowered. It encourages more candidates to run for office and promotes positive issue-based campaigns, discouraging mud-slinging among candidates who must compete for second and third-place votes from each others' supporters. It also more accurately gauges the true level of support that exists for each candidate since voters are no longer afraid that a vote for their favorite candidate may help his or her political opposite.

The Green Party of Santa Fe wholeheartedly supports the adoption of RCV in Santa Fe, and our RCV Action Team is working to educate voters about the importance of having RCV in Santa Fe (and around the country!)

Does RCV sound like a good idea to you? Then come help out the Green Party RCV Team - we'll be handing out RCV literature and bumper stickers, talking to people about RCV, and working to get out the vote on March 4th.

To learn more about RCV and how it works, visit:
http://www.fairvote.org http://www.votingmatters.net
Or contact Rick Lass at 920-0540 or ricklass@newmmexico.com