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This is an independent opinion. Have one of your own? Write it! Email it to hoa@ivn.us The New York Times ran a story recently about Marina Udgodskaya, a cleaning woman who ran for office against her boss, the incumbent mayor of Povalikhino, Russia, and won. In the middle of our current elections, this headline is eye-catching. Everyone loves a story where the underdog pulls off an upset victory. The article goes on to explain, however, that her candidacy was actually an example of what happen

Her son’s third birthday party and his preschool field trip, those are the SeaWorld memories Anna M. holds dear. As a season passholder, she gushed about how fortunate children in San Diego are to get exposure to animals up close between the Zoo and SeaWorld. “They aren’t just reading about them in a book or watching them on TV. My son has seen a real-life manatee. I didn’t know what a manatee was at his age!” said Anna, who preferred not to disclose her full name to protect her privacy. The c

Some county registrars lock up equipment and threaten dismissal to protect California’s early votes from being tallied before election day. The state legislature changed election law this year so election officials could scan ballots as they come in, to deal with an expected crush of ballots well before election day. Officials wanted to be sure the count wouldn’t be slowed by the decision to send each voter a mail ballot because of the pandemic. Ballots have been coming in at a record pace. As

VotePact is a voting strategy that advocates that people vote for their actual preferences by pairing up with someone on the other side of the Democratic-Republican divide. So people can strategically vote for the candidates they most like without fear of helping those they most fear. Instead of effectively cancelling out each other -- one for Trump and one for Biden, they can both vote Libertarian or Green or whatever they want. It is effectively DIY ranked choice voting, which allows voters t

Rancho Peñasquitos mother Cheryl Canson said she’s become increasingly concerned about her son, Jordan Jackson, an inmate at California State Prison, Sacramento. Jackson, who was sentenced to 35 years after severely injuring his infant son in 2011, is living with bipolar disorder. The stress of COVID-19 has worsened his mental health, Canson said. “(Prison officials) aren’t disclosing information about who is testing positive and it’s scary for inmates,” said Canson, who has become an advoca

On October 21, US billionaire businessman Mark Cuban tweeted that the duopoly he would shut down “in a nanosecond” if he could was the Republican and Democratic Parties, asserting that their anti-competitive collusion was detrimental to the American people every single day: ‍ Cuban understands what activists and leaders in the nonpartisan reform space have known for a long time. The rules at every level of our political infrastructure were written to serve the interests of the Republican and De

California is either about to right decades of inequality between rich and poor defendants by eliminating cash bail, or it’s about to turn over its justice system to robots. The question of what to do about the system that decides whether people should be free while awaiting trial will be determined by Proposition 25. The stakes, as explained by each side, are either ending an unjust system or relinquishing judicial authority to a pretrial assessment tool run on an algorithm. If passed, Prop.

This is an independent opinion. Have one of your own? Email it to hoa@ivn.us California’s 116 community colleges receive a fraction of the per-student spending compared to public universities in California even though they are the largest provider of higher education and workforce training in the nation and serve far greater proportions of low-income students, first-generation students and English learners. Despite being an economic engine playing a critical role in the upward social mobility

Represent San Diego and Independent Voter Project presented a screening of Daniel Falconer’s award-winning anti-corruption documentary, "UnRepresented," to an audience of 120 democracy reform advocates and concerned citizens on Oct. 10. The screening was followed by a lively and in-depth discussion of the challenges raised by the film’s unflinching look at the current state of American democracy. "UnRepresented" is a short film with a big message: legalized political corruption is ruining our d

The San Diego City Council on Tuesday discussed the option of filing a lawsuit that would allow the passage of Measure C — a special tax measure that would increase lodging taxes — despite it failing to receive a two-thirds majority vote in the March primary. Measure C asked that a tax be levied on overnight lodging guests between the range of 1.25% and 3.25% with revenue going toward the expansion of the San Diego Convention Center. Under the California Constitution, special tax measures requ