A veto is coming on the council’s voting proposal. Here’s what you need to know.

Albuquerque Mayor Tim Keller plans to veto the City Council’s proposal to change the city’s voting system this week, but if councilors vote the same way they did initially, they will have enough votes to override it. 

The council can override a veto with a majority — five — plus one vote. 

At their last meeting, councilors on a 6-3 vote approved a proposal to put on the November ballot a measure to eliminate the threshold to win an election. 

An initial proposal — sponsored by Councilors Dan Lewis and Klarissa Peña — would have allowed a mayor or city councilor to be elected with at least 40% of the total vote, instead of the current 50%, but then councilors approved allowing anyone with the most votes to win. The proposal would allow a plurality voting system rather than a majority voting system and eliminate run-off elections.     

Councilor Louie Sanchez — who voted in favor of the proposal — did not directly answer questions about whether he would vote to override a veto and said instead he was “not the biggest fan of the 40%” proposal but said they “can’t continue to close the voters’ mouth.”

“I think it’s extremely important that the voter has a chance to chime in on things that we do,” Sanchez said. “So many times we as elected officials don’t give them that opportunity, and I want to give them that opportunity to say yes or no.”

Last week Secretary of State Maggie Toulouse Oliver sent a letter to Keller and council members calling the proposal a “big step in the wrong direction,” and saying she has deep concerns about its impact on the electoral process. She acknowledged that run-off elections “come with hefty price tags, and their timing typically means fewer eligible voters make their voices heard at the ballot box” but said they are still preferable to the council’s proposal.

In response, Lewis told City Desk ABQ the letter was a “power grab,” and Toulouse Oliver “does not want voters to vote.” Lewis said he plans to vote to override the mayor’s veto and at the council’s June 3 meeting, he said there “is nothing more undemocratic than run-off elections.”

Other councilors who voted for the proposal — Brook Bassan, Dan Champine, Renée Grout and Klarissa Peña — did not respond to emails and calls from City Desk ABQ.

In 2017, Lewis lost to Keller in a runoff election. The two were among eight candidates on the ballot in the general election, where Keller received 39.35% of the votes and Lewis received 22.93%.

If Albuquerque voters pass a plurality voting system, the city will be the only major municipality in the state to do so. In fact, officials from the Secretary of State’s Office and Common Cause New Mexico said they are unaware of any other municipalities that have implemented a plurality voting system. The Municipal League of New Mexico said the cities that have runoff elections (a category that includes ranked choice voting) are Albuquerque, Gallup, Las Cruces, Rio Rancho and Santa Fe. 

Alex Curtas, director of communications for the Secretary of State’s Office, said Las Cruces and Santa Fe have a ranked-choice voting system, which Toulouse Oliver called in her letter the best solution to the city’s runoff structure. 

At the council’s June 3 meeting, Councilors Tammy Fiebelkorn and Nichole Rogers introduced an ordinance to adopt a ranked-choice voting system, which allows voters to rank candidates by preference on a ballot. That measure failed on a 3-6 vote. 

Fiebelkorn said she is thankful Keller is planning to veto the “disastrous proposal” and said she will vote against an override and hopes councilors will reconsider it after hearing the top election official’s concerns. 

“I want the person who has the true majority of voters, whether it’s in a City Council district or city wide for the mayor, elected to represent the citizens, not some plurality,” Fiebelkorn said. “Looking back at all of the public comments from the last three council meetings, I don’t believe a single person has said ‘we want this.’”

Mason Graham, a policy director for Common Cause New Mexico, was one of the public commenters who spoke against changing the voting system at the last two council meetings. 

Graham told City Desk ABQ that a plurality voting system in a city as large as Albuquerque is an ineffective way for elected officials to serve and Common Cause is working to educate voters about the potential impacts. 

“We’ll be working on some public education and getting information out to Albuquerque and New Mexicans of how harmful this is,” Graham said. “With the 40% at least we could expect a runoff, but with this, there’s also a possibility that candidates could enter into races with the intent of splitting the votes so a particular candidate can win. Watering it down to anything less than a majority is nondemocratic.”