This bill creates statutory authority for counties, cities, towns, school districts, fire districts, and port districts in Washington to adopt and use ranked choice voting (RCV). It adds new sections and amends multiple RCWs to define RCV and two counting methods (instant runoff for single-winner contests and single transferable vote for multiwinner contests), to require secretary of state rules implementing the methods by May 1, 2026, and to assign county auditors responsibility for ballot design, implementation, and vote counting within their counties. The bill changes existing law on primaries and general election certification, including adding a statutory definition of “primary” for jurisdictions that use RCV. The bill makes several procedural changes: jurisdictions may apply RCV to some or all offices but may not use it in contests with two or fewer candidates; county auditors must design ballots allowing voters to rank candidates in order of preference (including provision for one write-in) and must allow voters to rank at least five candidates per office; it establishes rules for skipped or duplicate rankings and invalid write-ins; it requires a non-RCV primary for single-winner general elections conducted with RCV that narrows the field to five candidates (voters may vote for one candidate in that primary), and it prohibits primaries for multiwinner RCV contests. The bill also amends tie procedures so ties at any point in RCV counting are resolved by lot and requires that ties before the final round be resolved expeditiously. The bill addresses implementation, costs, and ballot ordering: county auditors must notify the public and run voter education campaigns when a jurisdiction adopts RCV, with costs of that work reimbursed by the adopting jurisdiction; costs of implementing RCV tabulation systems are to be apportioned to the jurisdiction using RCV; voting-system certification criteria are amended to account for RCV; offices elected using RCV must be grouped together on ballots; and RCW 29A.04.127 is repealed. The act is conditional on funding: if specific funding for this act is not provided in the omnibus appropriations act by June 30, 2025, the act is null and void. The extracted text is incomplete in places. Key details located in “section 2 of this act” (including the full statutory text defining RCV and procedural specifics), parts of the amendment to RCW 29A.36.170, the secretary of state rules, and the bill or chapter number referenced for the funding condition are not provided in the extracted facts, so those provisions cannot be fully described here.

If enacted, the bill lets counties, cities, towns, school boards, fire districts, and port districts choose to run local elections using ranked choice voting, requires county auditors to redesign ballots so voters can rank at least five candidates, and changes how primaries and general elections work for those races (single-winner general elections would be limited to the top five primary candidates, multiwinner contests use a different counting method and have no primary). County auditors will be responsible for implementing and counting RCV elections in their county, ties in RCV counts are to be broken by lot, and the secretary of state must write rules to fill in technical details by May 1, 2026. The practical cost and administrative burden will fall most heavily on county auditors and the jurisdictions that adopt RCV: counties must upgrade or obtain tabulation equipment, train staff, design ballots, and run voter education campaigns, while the adopting city, town, district, or port must reimburse or proportionately pay those implementation and outreach costs (with county treasurers transferring funds as certified); districts with their own treasurers pay directly. The law also requires accessibility for people with limited English proficiency and disabilities, and voting systems must meet certification rules that accommodate ranked voting. Important implementation details and the full list of covered costs are not included in the extracted text, and the act is void unless specific funding is provided in the omnibus appropriations act by June 30, 2025.