RI reviewing Instant runoff voting

PROVIDENCE, R.I. (AP/WPRI) -- A Rhode Island task force is meeting to examine possible changes to the state's voting system.

The Voter Choice Study Commission is meeting Thursday afternoon at the Statehouse.

The 16-member panel will review presentations on instant-runoff voting from URI and New York University political professors.

Instant runoff has voters rank candidates by preference. If no candidate wins a majority, the last-place candidate is eliminated and those who ranked the eliminated candidate first will be counted based on their second-place candidate. The process continues until a candidate has a majority.

The process is intended to prevent the cost or labor of mounting runoff elections and allow voters to cast ballots without worrying that they are "wasting their vote" on unlikely candidates.

The commission was created by lawmakers and is expected to report its findings next year.