Memphis City Council quietly works on anti-instant runoffs bill

The Memphis City Council worked behind the scenes to find a sponsor for legislation this year that could ban instant-runoff elections statewide and forestall the Shelby County Election Commission from using the method for the first time in 2019.

The council recently instructed The Ingram Group — a well-connected, Nashville-based lobbying firm the council hired for $120,000 per year in November — to ask Republican Sen. Ken Yager of Kingston to carry the bill this year, council attorney Allan Wade confirmed Monday.

Republican Rep. Mark White of Memphis, who proposed the bill last year but made little headway, said the firm also approached him on the council's behalf to ask if he would again sponsor the bill in the House.

According to Wade, the bill was moving "full speed ahead" anyway, and the maneuver puts the council in a better position to ask for an amendment that would require cities to opt into the ban.

"We could care less about instant runoff voting," Wade said of the method of voting that allows voters to rank their first-, second- and third-choice candidates.

But White said that Yager is the one who's pushing the bill forward — even though they haven't spoken about the bill yet. Although White originally filed the bill last year over worries instant runoffs could contradict state laws, he's still rolling it in a subcommittee while he does research and tries to understand how instant-runoff elections work.

Aaron Fowles, an organizer of the Save Instant Runoff Memphis campaign, said the council is using taxpayer dollars to circumvent the will of the taxpayers, who in 2008 voted to the tune of 71 percent to use instant runoffs in council elections to save money and time and increase dismal turnouts.

"Now they are using our money to take away that choice from us," Fowles said.

Council members — some of whom could have been in danger of losing their elections under instant runoffs — already voted to add two contradictory referendums to the Nov. 6 ballot: one switching to a single winner-takes-all election and the other maintaining the status quo by eliminating instant runoffs.

Although Wade acknowledged the council's involvement in bringing Yager on, he said Yager is calling the shots now. Although the council members worry an outright ban would set a precedent for legislative preemption, their recent votes show they probably aren't opposed to a ban originating from the city, Wade added.

Yager contributed to the death of a piece of preemptive legislation in 2016 that would have allowed citizens annexed after 1998 to petition for a referendum on de-annexation, perhaps with devastating consequences for larger cities. Memphis officials, as well as officials from other large cities, strongly opposed the bill.

“We thought he was reasonable and would listen to our point of view,” Wade said of why Yager was selected.

And so far, Wade said, the strategy seems to be working. "At least, for the first time, we have people talking to us and not cramming it down our throats."

Yager didn’t return calls seeking comment Monday.

Council members and Mayor Jim Strickland have loudly denounced the legislature for preempting the city's ability to make its own decisions — most recently when a state historic preservation law that blocked efforts to remove Confederate monuments.

The council is in the early stages of its first foray into the world of lobbying. Before hiring The Ingram Group, the council relied on the lobbyists employed by the mayor's administration, with the mayor ultimately setting the legislative agenda in Nashville.

Asked whether the council should be using taxpayer dollars to lobby against a measure approved by voters, Wade said the council uses taxpayer dollars "to do a lot of things" individuals don't like. But council members "speak for our people" — and the constituents were telling their representatives they didn't want instant runoffs, he said.

The Ingram Group's work for the council is overseen by a government relations committee chaired by council member Kemp Conrad, who didn't return a call Monday while he was out of town or last week.

The Ingram Group was founded by Tom Ingram, a veteran political operative who ran the campaigns of Gov. Bill Haslam and the state's two sitting U.S. senators, Lamar Alexander and Bob Corker.

The council's executive committee was scheduled to discuss instant runoffs at 2 p.m. Tuesday. Wade said the committee will discuss the legislation and the council's involvement.

Fowles called on the council to denounce the Yager/White bill. The status quo — an 80 percent drop in turnout from the general election to the runoff — may help elected politicians, but it means fewer people living in poverty will vote, he added.

“Instead of just disenfranchising some of the city’s citizens unable to return to the polls for a runoff election, they’re disenfranchising all of us,” Fowles said of the bill.

Reach Ryan Poe at poe@commercialappeal.com and on Twitter at @ryanpoe.