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• And the last type was winner take all. One election, whoever gets the most number of <br />votes wins, no matter if they get a majority or not. So I guess the way Honolulu <br />patterned its nonpartisan election is as I described first. If you get 50% or more, you <br />win outright. If you don't get 50%, you go to a run-off with the number two vote getter. <br />The issue was presented to the voters and 1 have to say, by reading this, it was not - I <br />guess the Charter Commission at that time favored nonpartisan, so it was written - the <br />questions and the rationale were slanted that way. It wasn't an even handed type of <br />discussion. In this past Charter Commission, we tried to give the pros and cons. I <br />wanted to give the pros and cons. They said, like John Henry Felix said, that partisan <br />politics has little to do with local government. Local government's about providing <br />basic public services and there's a quote that sometimes we talk, and I think it's heeded <br />in the City and County of Honolulu, that "there's not a Democratic, Republican or Green <br />way to pave a road". And no matter what we've been able to do - the council, it's been <br />great working in this job - we see the council get along and John Henry's a very <br />important part of that. And when I look at the issue of partisan politics, I think there is a <br />place for partisan politics in government but I just feel thankful that John Henry is able, <br />even though he's a Republican, because we have the nonpartisan system, to hold a <br />leadership position and I don't know if that would be possible if we were in another form <br />of arrangement. Before I got asked to come to this conference, I would tell people, it's <br />great we have John Henry there. He has more experience than all of our Council <br />• Members put together, probably, in government. But enough about John Henry. <br />Now, just as to our perspective, working as one of the line departments as Corporation <br />Counsel, we find, and I don't know if it operates this way on the Big Island, but the way <br />that the City operates does not depend on what party you're a Member of, the way we <br />see it work everyday. The way the council relates to the Mayor doesn't hinge on <br />whether he's a Democrat or Republican. The way the Mayor relates to the council <br />doesn't hinge on that either so that's kind of nice, in my position where I have two <br />masters basically. John Henry's my boss and the Mayor's my boss and the department <br />heads are my boss. It works for us. I don't know how it would work in another system, <br />in the prior system, because I wasn't part of the City then but I can say this system <br />works. That's all I have to say. <br />RAY: Okay, so I'm going to open it up for questions now so raise your <br />hand. John Santangelo. <br />SANTANGELO: I just want to go over real quick here, some of the facts you gave <br />us. When you said the 100 largest cities, 69 responded, 23% had partisan. What part <br />had non? <br />ARAKAWA: 77%. Of the 69 that responded. <br />