How to Host an Election or Get Involved with STAR Voting

Updated

STAR Voting's website (starvoting.org) offers two distinct paths depending on your goal: if you want to run an election using the STAR method, the site points you to a "Host Election" section and a scheduling tool called BetterVoting; if you want to advance voting reform more broadly, it provides campaign resources, legislative templates, local chapters, and volunteer sign-ups. The site also publishes case studies, technical specifications, and auditing materials for anyone who needs to verify or evaluate the method before committing.

Hosting an election with STAR Voting

The site's "Host Election" area is the starting point for organizations, campaigns, or groups that want to run a STAR election themselves. According to the site, hosting options include working with BetterVoting for scheduling and election administration.

Before you host, it helps to understand what you're asking voters to do, because STAR's ballot design is the part most people haven't seen before.

What voters actually do

  1. Score every candidate from 0 to 5 stars. Give your favorite(s) five stars; give your last choice(s) zero or leave them blank. Equal scores across candidates are allowed.
  2. Scoring round: the two highest-scoring candidates overall become finalists.
  3. Automatic runoff: the runoff is a classic one-person, one-vote comparison between those two finalists. Your ballot already records your preference, so your full vote goes to whichever finalist you scored higher.
  4. Winner: the finalist with the most votes in the runoff wins.

The key mechanic to explain to voters is that they never have to choose between "voting their conscience" and "voting strategically" — the runoff handles that automatically from the scores they already gave.

Practical steps

  • Go to the Host Election section of starvoting.org to see the hosting options and the BetterVoting scheduling path.
  • Review the Case Studies and Technical Specifications pages if you need to justify the method to a board, committee, or membership.
  • Check the Auditing and Risk Limiting Audits materials if your election requires a post-election verification process.
  • Look at the Cost Analysis page if budget approval is part of your decision.

The site does not publish pricing for hosting or for BetterVoting on the pages summarized here, so treat cost as something to confirm directly rather than assume is free.

Getting involved in the reform campaign

If your interest is advocacy rather than running a single election, the site organizes participation into several concrete tracks:

Track What the site offers
Campaigns Endorsements, past campaigns, and a British Columbia referendum and LA charter reform example
Launch an initiative Initiative templates and campaign materials
Chapters Start or join a local chapter
Legislation Templates for drafting or proposing legislation
Volunteering Sign-up form, volunteer roles, and an events calendar
Activist toolkit Resources for organizing and outreach
Donations Equal Vote Coalition 501c3 (tax-deductible) and the STAR Action Fund

The site also maintains a Shop, a Blog, Articles, Videos, Podcasts, and Press section, plus a FAQ — useful if you need ready-made explanations before talking to a group.

Why the site frames this as fixing a broken system

The homepage's central claim is that the current system forces voters to choose between conscience and strategy, and that STAR addresses this by making vote-splitting safe and electing majority-preferred winners "whenever possible." It also states STAR is "vetted and peer-reviewed, topping the charts in all studies of accuracy and representativeness," and that it is endorsed by organizations and leaders throughout Oregon. Those are the site's own claims — if you're presenting STAR to a decision-making body, the Technical Specifications and Case Studies pages are where you'd go to check the supporting detail rather than repeating the summary language.

A note on Ranked Choice Voting

The site explicitly addresses how STAR differs from Ranked Choice Voting in a dedicated section. If your organization is already considering RCV, read that comparison before deciding, since the two methods produce different ballots and different counting behavior — the distinction matters for both voter education and any software or auditing setup you'd need.

Where to start

  • Running an election: Host Election section → BetterVoting scheduling → review Case Studies and Technical Specifications.
  • Advocating for reform: Campaigns or Launch an Initiative → Chapters → Volunteer sign-up.
  • Evaluating the method: FAQ, Technical Specifications, Auditing, and Cost Analysis.
  • Supporting the effort: Donate to the Equal Vote Coalition 501c3 or the STAR Action Fund.