Tomorrow is Final Decision Day. Our news coverage has been great!

[in...@betterballotkc.org]

 Vote NO 

on MO Amendment 7

No Ban on Ranked Choice Voting

vote-no-ranking-ban.org

See our page on Media Coverage for the whole list. Summary:

Final tally, state-wide

Newspaper opinion pieces to vote NO on Amendment 7: eleven, including two where the newspaper endorsed a no vote

Opinion pieces to Vote YES: zero 

Yes, that's zero.  And no newspaper endorsements for a yes vote. 

They have no registered campaign committee. And almost all of their spokespersons are Missouri legislators or state official candidates, while ours are mainly ordinary citizens - quite the contrast, and befitting something that the legislature put on the ballot.

We don't have a tally on letters to the editor, but we do know that there were several that made a fine case for a no vote

We sent out a total of ten press releases giving background information - around 500 individual emails. Plus many follow-up phone calls, of course. The pdfs of the releases are at the bottom of the Media Coverage page.

The News Campaign We Could Never Have Had Otherwise

There are so far 33 reports found from all around the state -- newspaper, TV, and radio -- that cover both sides. Most of them explain what ranked choice voting is. 

How much we've hoped for this! For so long, we've wanted such an educational campaign. But we couldn't get it, of course. We couldn't just call up a station or newspaper and tell them we think this is important and could they be ever so kind as to cover it. 

But because there was an election campaign, as you can see from the list on our Media Coverage page, we've gotten thousands upon thousands of Missourians exposed to at least the first inkling of the idea that ranked choice voting could be a good idea. 

We've also done six talk shows, where listeners get way more depth. 

Text Banking

We've had a text banking campaign focused on the counties that have Joplin, Cape Girardeau, Warrensburg, and Rolla. These are rural areas with college towns. 

This is what we've had connection to as the campaign committee focused only on Amendment 7. Other groups in the state have included defeating Amendment 7 as one of their projects, so more is going on than we can report. 

As for yes-on-7, we know at least one out-of-state group has sent out enough texts to have one reported to us, so at least the yes side is doing that much. 

So Do We Win? 

Darned if we know. Despite all the advantages above, they have one major ace in the hole: the Ballot Candy will likely be effective with anyone who hasn't been warned against it. A large number of voters don't follow the news outlets that have covered it. 

Our low budget has meant we've had no mailers and not much advertising. We've had the above media coverage, an unknown amount of spreading the word on social media, and we've distributed thousands of card flyers in person-to-person contacts at a large variety of places all over the state. Plus a few hundred yard signs. That's it. 

Will it be enough? Can such a shoe-string operation prevail over a yes campaign that relies mostly on the ballot wording? 

We expect to find out after the polls close tomorrow. 

And remember . . . 

Friends don't let friends vote without knowing how important a no vote on this is!

You can use the images below or your own wording on your social media to influence for a no vote. If you've done it already but that was a while ago, right near the election is a good time to do it again. And personal phone calls to people you know can be very effective. 

See also our Spreading the Word page for links for tweets to share and other ideas. 

-- Rachel MacNair

Voice and text: 816-753-2057

Note: I don't do watch parties; my habit is to go to bed early on election night and wake up early to find final results. I plan to send out our result with commentary to these announcement lists on Wednesday morning. 

Missouri

St. Louis, For information, flier cards to give out, and yard signs, text Austin Brown at 314-374-1431

Columbia  Flier cards and yard signs available from: Peter Schneeberger at 573-529-5475

Kansas City: contact Rachel MacNair at 816-753-2057.

the rest of Missouri, We have fliers on our website that you can print up and have on hand more quickly.