Section 951 of the Dodd-Frank Act requires companies that are subject to the SEC’s proxy rules to include in their proxy statements “a separate resolution subject to shareholder vote” to determine whether a shareholder vote on executive compensation will occur every 1, 2, or 3 years.   When the SEC was considering amendments to its rules to implement this requirement, I argued that corporations should be free to use other voting rules such as a Borda count or preference ranking system.  See "Counting The Vote When There Are Three Choices".   Although the SEC noted my comment (and a similar comment from the Society of Corporate Secretaries and Governance Professionals) in its adopting release, the SEC declined to take up the suggestion.

Thus, I was pleased to hear that the City of San Francisco is using a more sophisticated approach to voting.  In the city's election today, voters will use a ranked-preference system to elect a mayor from a field of 16 candidates.  You can read or listen to NPR's story on the election here.  San Francisco isn't the only city using ranked-choice voting.  Here is the form of ballot being used in the mayoral election today in Portland, Maine .

It is dismaying that the SEC chose to adopt a system that obfuscates rather than clarifies stockholder preferences.  These and other cities are demonstrating that they can do what the SEC refused to do.