Weighted Voting

"Weighted Voting" refers to the provision in Irrigation District law ORS 545.007(1)(e) allowing an elector to vote according to their assessed acres in the district. This part of the law has been in place since 1993. WVID has traditionally ran elections as 1 vote per elector. There are currently 55 electors in the district representing 81 taxlots. All taxlots in the same legal name are lumped together for total assessed acres. How this plays out come election time, is that electors would receive a number of ballots according to their assessed acres in the district. There would be 19 electors with "1" vote, 30 electors with "2" votes, and 6 electors with "3" votes bringing the total possible number of ballots cast to 97.

Most of the ditch companies in the county operate in this same way and vote according to the number of "shares" each "shareholder" owns in the ditch company. Ditch company's differ from Irrigation Districts in that ditch company's write their own Articles of Incorporation and are private corporations. Irrigation Districts are public body's and are governed by Oregon Revised Statutes (ORS) including Public Meeting and Public Records laws.

The reason for weighted voting is so that those making a living with agriculture have a fair representation in the elections of the district. The provisions of Irrigation District Law only allow electors to vote for:

1. Board of Directors (possible if more than one candidate applies)

2. Merger/Union of Irrigation Districts (not likely to occur here)

3. Acquisition of domestic or municipal water works (not likely to occur here)

4. Construction of Improvements in the District (possible)

Click here Elections/Voting Rights for more details.

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