Better Elections for Los Angeles: Why the City Needs Ranked Choice Voting and Proportional Representation
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Summary
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Los Angeles has a rare opportunity at meaningfully improving its democracy. The city's Charter Reform Commission (CRC) has taken a historic step, recommending that LA implement ranked choice voting and expand the City Council to better serve its nearly four million residents. Cal RCV celebrates that decision.
To achieve the gold standard of representative democracy, Los Angeles should pair council expansion with multi-member districts elected by Proportional Ranked Choice Voting (PRCV). The Charter Reform Commission did not vote to recommend PRCV — but Cal RCV believes the case for it remains compelling, and we will continue advocating for it as the City Council considers what to place before voters. PRCV is not a radical idea. It is the proven path to making City Hall reflect the city it serves.
Cal RCV urges the Los Angeles City Council to place multi-member districts with PRCV for City Council seats on the November 2026 ballot. Failing that, we strongly recommend council give voters the opportunity to choose single-winner ranked choice voting via ballot measure. Single-winner RCV is a meaningful improvement over the current system and will have a very positive impact. PRCV would go even further. These reforms give Los Angeles the most inclusive, representative, and accountable City Council in the nation.
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What Is Ranked Choice Voting, and What Is PRCV?
Ranked choice voting (RCV) is a simple upgrade to how we vote. Instead of picking just one candidate, voters rank them in order of preference: first choice, second choice, third choice, and so on. If no candidate wins a majority of first-choice votes, the candidate with the fewest votes is eliminated and their votes transfer to those voters' next choice. This continues until one candidate earns a majority.
Proportional ranked choice voting (PRCV) takes the same idea and applies it to districts that elect multiple representatives. In a three-seat district, the threshold to win is 25% plus one vote. If a candidate receives more votes than that threshold, their surplus votes transfer to the next preferences on their supporters' ballots. If no one hits the threshold, the lowest vote-getter is eliminated and their votes transfer. The process repeats until three candidates have each reached the threshold and are declared winners.
The result is that instead of one community winning everything and everyone else losing, multiple communities within the same district can each elect a representative who reflects their values. You can watch a clear visual explanation of how PRCV works from More Equitable Democracy here:
You can also see how Portland's specific PRCV system works from Rose City Reform here: https://youtu.be/9iZLW8FzUxQ
What Problems Do These Reforms Address?
Zero-sum elections pit communities against each other
In a single-seat, winner-take-all district, one community wins and everyone else loses. Los Angeles has substantial Black (11% of citizen voting age population), AAPI (12%), Latino (37%), and White (37%) communities, and the current election system forces those groups into direct, "if you win, I lose" competition. When only one side can win, there is constant incentive to draw district lines to lock in your group's advantage and lock others out. That zero-sum dynamic is not an accident of bad actors. It is built into the structure of the current system.
Low-turnout primaries decide most elections
Since 2020, nearly 60% of LA City Council races have been decided in low-turnout primary elections rather than in November general elections, when turnout is highest and the electorate most diverse. In 2024, White voters made up 48% of primary voters despite representing just 32% of the voting population. Latino voter participation was significantly lower in primaries than in general elections. The decisions that matter most are being made in elections where protected communities are systematically underrepresented.
Concentrated power breeds corruption
When a single council member is the sole political authority over a district representing 260,000 people, accountability is weak and the temptation for abuse is strong. Between 2020 and 2024, three LA councilmembers were jailed and another was indicted on felony charges. The 2022 "Fed Tapes" scandal, in which recordings captured council members using racist language while discussing how to manipulate the redistricting process for political gain, was the most visible symptom of a deeper structural disease. Multi-member districts reduce the concentration of power in any one person's hands, diffusing authority and increasing accountability.
Wasted votes
In Los Angeles' current system, 30%-49% of votes cast within a council district do not help elect anyone. In Portland's first PRCV election in 2024, 87% of voters helped elect at least one candidate they ranked. The difference is structural: proportional systems are designed to minimize wasted votes.
AAPI and Black communities are structurally excluded
The data is stark. Researchers at More Equitable Democracy used GerryChain, an academic redistricting simulation tool, to generate 10,000 random maps across every council expansion scenario from 23 to 33 single-seat districts. The findings were consistent across every scenario:
Racial Group | Seats of Influence: Single-Seat Districts | Seats of Influence: 3-Seat PRCV Districts |
Asian Americans & Pacific Islanders | 0 to 1 | 4 to 5 |
Black | 1 to 2 | 3 to 4 |
Latino | 13 to 18 | Roughly stable |
White | 11 to 15 | Roughly stable |
Even when drawing maps that maximally packed AAPI voters into the fewest possible districts in a 33-seat scenario, the best achievable AAPI concentration in any single district was 41%, still surrounded by substantial Latino and White populations, with no guarantee of electing a candidate of their choice. For Black voters, the best-case scenario produced three districts capped at 46% Black, each simultaneously 43 to 50% Latino.
The conclusion is not that LA's Black and AAPI communities lack political presence. They are major forces in this city. The current system structurally prevents their representation, and simply adding more single-seat districts will not fix that.
Three Crucial Reforms for Three Problems
Los Angeles is debating several reforms at once, and each one addresses a different weakness in the current system.
Expand the City Council so residents have more representatives.
Adopt ranked choice voting so elections are decided in one high-turnout election instead of costly and unrepresentative contingent top-two elections.
Adopt multi-member districts, making RCV proportional, so more communities can elect candidates who represent them.
Together these reforms can create a city government that is more representative, more efficient, and more trusted.
Background: How We Got Here
Los Angeles has had 15 city council seats since 1925, when the city's population was a fraction of what it is today. The current system of single-seat districts has produced recurring redistricting wars, because in a winner-take-all world, every district line drawn is a high-stakes political battle over who gains representation and who does not.
The California Voting Rights Act (CVRA), passed in 2001, attempted to address the worst abuses of this system by giving racial minorities the right to elect or influence candidates of their choice in local elections. Since then, the CVRA has compelled over 190 changes from at-large to single-seat district elections across California. But in a city as diverse as Los Angeles, with three major protected-class communities each geographically dispersed, the single-seat district remedy creates its own zero-sum problem. Protecting one community's representation can come at the expense of another's.
In October 2022, the Fed Tapes scandal made that dynamic impossible to ignore. In response, LA voters approved Measure DD in November 2024, creating a new Independent Redistricting Commission. That was a necessary step, but it does not change the underlying math. Even a perfectly neutral commission drawing lines in good faith cannot make a winner-take-all system proportional. Someone still wins everything and everyone else still loses.
Other cities have already shown the way forward. Portland, Oregon amended its city charter in 2022 to adopt four three-seat PRCV districts. In its first 2024 election, Portland's council became half women, with five members of color, four LGBTQ+ members, three renters, and members from 12 different neighborhoods, including the first millennials ever elected to Portland's council. In Albany, California, the first California city to use PRCV (adopted in 2020), the first Latino and first Asian candidates were elected in the very first PRCV election cycle.
In 2023, the California Supreme Court's Pico Neighborhood Association v. City of Santa Monica decision explicitly recognized PRCV as a valid and effective remedy under the CVRA, especially for communities that are geographically dispersed and cannot easily be concentrated in single-seat districts. The legal foundation for PRCV in Los Angeles is solid.
Why This Matters for California
Los Angeles is not just any American city. It is the nation's second-largest city and one of its most diverse. No simple line-drawing solution can serve all of its communities fairly within single-seat districts. The math does not work.
If LA gets this right, it creates a model for diverse cities everywhere, at a moment when California courts have already pointed toward PRCV as the appropriate tool for multi-racial communities that cannot be neatly sorted into winner-take-all districts. Cal RCV presented this case directly to the Charter Reform Commission in hearings throughout fall 2025, and will continue making it to the City Council. You can watch that testimony here:
Known Obstacles, and Why They Are Surmountable
The voting system needs an upgrade
LA County's Voting Solutions for All People (VSAP) system was custom-built without RCV capability. Adding it will require contracting work, likely with Smartmatic (which built VSAP) or a certified third party, and eventual certification by the California Secretary of State. Two RCV modules are already California-certified: Hart Intercivic and Dominion Voting Systems. Other California jurisdictions, including San Francisco, Alameda County, Humboldt County, and Riverside County, have completed this process. There is no reason LA County cannot do the same.
Voter education requires investment
Voters will need to learn a new ballot format. Portland spent approximately $1.98 per voter on its PRCV education program. Alaska spent roughly $1.50 per voter for its first RCV statewide election. Applied to LA's approximately 2.19 million registered voters, a comprehensive education effort would cost around $4.4 million, with higher upfront costs that decline over time. Education should be multilingual, community-based, and delivered through trusted local organizations, following best practices from Portland and New York City.
The timeline is tight but achievable
April 2026: CRC submits recommendations to the City Council
July 2026: City Council places an RCV or PRCV measure on the ballot
November 2026: Voters approve RCV or PRCV and council expansion
2027 to 2030: LA County upgrades VSAP to handle ranked ballots
2030 to 2031: New district maps drawn; public education campaign runs
2032: First LA City Council elections under RCV or PRCV
RCV and PRCV save money
Critics of reform sometimes raise cost concerns, but implementing either RCV or PRCV actually saves taxpayers money. Both reforms allow the city to eliminate primaries by deciding every race in November. And with both systems, a majority of voters elect a majority of the seats in the higher-turnout general election.
Jurisdiction | Savings from Eliminating Runoffs |
New York City | ~$11 million per election cycle |
San Francisco | ~$1.6 million per year |
Oakland | ~$464,000 per year |
Los Angeles (estimated) | ~$1.5 million per 2-year cycle on a 15-seat council |
The 2023 LA special election alone cost $7.5 million for two rounds. PRCV would have eliminated the special election runoff, saving over $3 million. Beyond those direct savings, RCV and PRCV extend the reach of LA's public matching funds program, because funds only need to cover one election instead of two.
What Success Looks Like
The Charter Reform Commission has recommended single-winner ranked choice voting for Los Angeles. That recommendation now goes to the City Council, which must decide by July 2026 whether to refer RCV or PRCV to voters as ballot measures. If voters approve single-winner RCV, the change would be meaningful and immediate.
Under single-winner RCV, Los Angeles would consolidate its elections into a single high-turnout November contest, replacing the current two-stage system of a March or June primary followed by a general election. That shift matters more than it might seem. Today, most council races are effectively decided in low-turnout primaries, where the electorate is smaller, older, and less representative of the city as a whole. In 2024, White voters made up 48% of primary voters despite being just 32% of the voting population. Moving to a single November election means more Angelenos, from every community, have a real say in who represents them. It also saves significant public money, since the city would fund one election per seat instead of two, and candidates would no longer need to raise money for two separate campaigns.
PRCV would build on those gains and go even further. The Charter Reform Commission did not recommend multi-member districts, but Cal RCV is disappointed by that outcome and will continue to advocate for PRCV as the City Council considers the full scope of what to refer to voters. If the City Council chooses to include PRCV on the November ballot, Los Angeles could eventually elect a council that reflects the full diversity of the city — not just the community that happened to turn out strongest in a given district. It is worth noting that adopting PRCV and multi-member districts would require revisiting several other aspects of the City Charter that currently assume each district has a single Councilmember. That added complexity is real — but Cal RCV believes the representation improvements are well worth it. In a three-seat PRCV district, the threshold to win is just 25% plus one vote. That means a district's Latino, Black, and AAPI communities can each have a voice, not because lines were drawn perfectly, but because the system itself is designed to produce proportional outcomes. Candidates would have incentives to build coalitions and seek second-choice votes rather than drive up turnout only within their base. Redistricting would become far less of a high-stakes battle, because no single line-drawing decision would determine whether an entire community wins or loses representation.
Portland achieved this in its first PRCV election. Albany, California achieved this with citywide PRCV. Los Angeles can do the same, at greater scale and with greater impact on American democracy.
The Window Is Open, and It Will Not Stay Open
The Charter Reform Commission submits its final recommendations by April 2, 2026. The City Council must act by this summer to place measures on the November 2026 ballot. If this window closes, the next opportunity to restructure LA's elections could be a generation away.
The Commission showed courage by recommending single-winner RCV and council expansion, and Cal RCV celebrates that. We are disappointed the Commission did not go further on PRCV, but that door is not yet closed. Cal RCV urges the City Council to place both single-winner RCV and PRCV with multi-member districts on the November 2026 ballot. Single-winner RCV is a real and meaningful improvement. PRCV is the reform that fully matches the scale of the problem and the diversity of the city.
Angelenos who want a fairer, more inclusive democracy should stay informed and be ready to contact their City Councilmember and the Mayor's office when the moment comes. Sign up below and we will let you know when it is time to act. The decision about how Los Angeles elects its government belongs to the people of Los Angeles.
The California RCV Coalition is a nonpartisan nonprofit dedicated to expanding ranked choice voting across California so every voter has a greater voice in our democracy.