Arlington County
RCV is happening now!
Since June 2023, Arlington County has been using Ranked Choice Voting. This November, they will continue to lead the way in using RCV to elect the next County Board member and ensure that person is supported by a true majority of Arlington voters.
Arlington voters like RCV:
In 2024, 88% of voters said RCV was easy to use.
In 2024, 67% of voters said they’d like to use it again!
FAQs
Why just the County Board?
The option to adopt ranked choice voting for local legislature elections (City Council or Board of Supervisors) comes from HB1103, a bill passed through the General Assembly in 2020. Arlington, specifically, was given this option by Del. Patrick Hope’s bill, HB506.
HB1103 created a pilot program, through which any locality could decide to try ranked choice voting for their elections. Both bills are narrowly focused and do not include an option to use ranked choice voting for elections for School Board or other constitutional offices.
If localities try ranked choice voting and like it, they can encourage the General Assembly to expand the pilot program to include other offices.
Arlington elects two Board members every four years. How does that work?
Every four years, two of the five at-large Board members are elected. With ranked choice voting, the voter experience doesn’t change – they still pick their favorite candidate, their second favorite, and so on. The way the votes are counted does change, as does the number of votes needed to win. This video helps explain multi-winner ranked choice voting elections.
Learn more about ranked choice voting in Arlington
FOX 5: (Adorably) explaining the ranked choice voting method
WTOP: Arlington Co. board asks for feedback on ranked choice voting
Arlington Now: Should Arlington County change its form of government?
Arlington Now: Ranked-choice voting could decide County Board nominees in June 2023 primaries
Inside NOVA: Survey closes; Arlington board will get data from ranked-choice-voting questionnaire
Voters can rank up to three candidates. You are NOT required to rank three candidates.
Vote for ONE candidate in each column.
Voting for a candidate in multiple columns does not help them. Your vote will only count for that candidate once.
DO NOT vote for multiple candidates in the same column - this will invalidate your ballot.