Fizz71
FragSwapper
The BOD met last night (Sunday) to discuss some of the concerns that were brought up pertaining to who may vote and how to vote if you weren't attending the swap. In attendance were: Brad, Bill, Tim, Scott, Mal, and myself. Mo had some issues attending and Sanjay and Jon were not available.
The first on the list was who can vote. Our bylaws our very specific in stating that only members can vote, so there was no doubt that those of you out there "lurking" or "on the fence" could not participate in the vote without becoming a member first. The real issue then was whether or not 2005 members should be included. It was a unanimous decision among those present to only allow 2006 membership to vote in the upcoming elections. My vote is only a tie breaker, but having 5 other BOD members agreeing on this point meant that we had Board majority without my vote or the 3 other BOD members present, so it was passed.
It is very important for NCPARS to start fully adopting its bylaws since this will be our first election having them. We know there are some quirks in the wording that can be worked out in the future, but we need to make our best efforts to stick with what the BOD votes is correct thing to do based on the interpretation of the bylaws.
That brings us to the electronic voting. The possibility of e-voting was written into the bylaws because we knew that it would be tough to get everybody in one room. But we also need to make sure that any e-voting that takes place still follows the OTHER bylaws on how a elections should be done. This was why we initially said that e-voting would not be allow this time around.
There were two issue regarding e-voting. First, the bylaws state the elections need to be done in order, for example the VP can not be voted on until the President is selected. Second was the fact that until the day of the event, we don't have an official "ballot". Additional nominations above what the nomination committee has slated will need to be taken at the time of the official election and all nominees will need to be seconded. This poses a problem if we want to do e-voting before the event.
Since we also feel that it is important that people who have paid their 2006 dues to STILL have a say in the election even though they aren't present at the meeting, we are going to do a special email ballot. This ballot (unlike the final ballot) will allow for write-ins and allow you to vote for more then one person in a position. Example: If A,B and C run for both president and vice president, you can vote for A for president, and A & B for vice president. If A wins the presidency, we will use B as your VP vote, if B or C wins the presidency we will use your A for your VP vote.
This concept allows you to vote in the same capacity as if you were present at the event. The write-ins will allow you to vote for somebody that you may expect to be added to the ballot at the event (and nominate them), even if they aren't on the nominating committee's slate of nominees.
More information on email voting will be posted in a few days. Why the delay? I will be looking for volunteers of people who are NOT on the current BOD, NOT running for office, but ARE coming to the swap to be a non-biased source of vote counting. We will setup a special email account with a NCPARS.org address that will be automatically forwarded to all of the people counting the votes. The volunteers will be free to do whatever they feel they need to do to ensure all the votes are counted for. They will also be part of vote counting at the event. I will start another thread about the volunteers so don't reply here.
The choice to do e-voting in this manor was also agreed upon unanimously by the BOD present at the meeting. We also talked about some other issues pertaining to the event (and the election) that are still being hammered out but they do not affect the e-voting or who can vote.
Bottom line......
If you want to vote in the upcoming election you MUST have your 2006 dues paid by 5/5/2006. If you want to e-vote and you have not mailed in your 2006 dues and you did not purchase your 2006 membership at the last 2005 swap you will need to send your check in IMMEDIATELY. We will require a post-mark of Friday May 5th, 2006. We do realize that this means we may not get your check until after the swap, but if you make a promise to us that your dues were sent, we will accept your email vote prior to receiving your dues. We didn't want this last second approval of e-voting to seem unfair because you only have 1 or 2 days to send a check in hopes that the mail service gets it to us on time. We're giving you 5 days...the last 5 days before the swap regardless of the speed of standard mail..and a promise from you that the dues were sent.
Keep in mind that if we have too many people whose checks don't make it here in time, but their votes do, we may need to delay the official announcement of the new BOD since we MUST have your dues before your vote is official. We don't want to open ourselves up to potential voter fraud. Hopefully it won't matter...we'll know at the event. So if you want to vote, please try to get your dues to us by Friday.
Also Keep in mind that e-voting is ONLY for the people NOT attending the swap. If you are attending the swap you can pay for your 2006 dues at the door. Those of you who paid your 2006 dues at the last 2005 swap, you're already set. You'll need to fill in new contact information at the door, but you're already paid for the year and part of the vote.
Look for a post here on RC in the next day or two for e-voting procedures. We'll post it as soon as our volunteers are selected.
Thank you for your support in the upcoming election, and good luck to the nominees! If you have any concerns we can address them here or through private message (or email).
Thanks again.
--Kevin Fizz
--President, NCPARS
The first on the list was who can vote. Our bylaws our very specific in stating that only members can vote, so there was no doubt that those of you out there "lurking" or "on the fence" could not participate in the vote without becoming a member first. The real issue then was whether or not 2005 members should be included. It was a unanimous decision among those present to only allow 2006 membership to vote in the upcoming elections. My vote is only a tie breaker, but having 5 other BOD members agreeing on this point meant that we had Board majority without my vote or the 3 other BOD members present, so it was passed.
It is very important for NCPARS to start fully adopting its bylaws since this will be our first election having them. We know there are some quirks in the wording that can be worked out in the future, but we need to make our best efforts to stick with what the BOD votes is correct thing to do based on the interpretation of the bylaws.
That brings us to the electronic voting. The possibility of e-voting was written into the bylaws because we knew that it would be tough to get everybody in one room. But we also need to make sure that any e-voting that takes place still follows the OTHER bylaws on how a elections should be done. This was why we initially said that e-voting would not be allow this time around.
There were two issue regarding e-voting. First, the bylaws state the elections need to be done in order, for example the VP can not be voted on until the President is selected. Second was the fact that until the day of the event, we don't have an official "ballot". Additional nominations above what the nomination committee has slated will need to be taken at the time of the official election and all nominees will need to be seconded. This poses a problem if we want to do e-voting before the event.
Since we also feel that it is important that people who have paid their 2006 dues to STILL have a say in the election even though they aren't present at the meeting, we are going to do a special email ballot. This ballot (unlike the final ballot) will allow for write-ins and allow you to vote for more then one person in a position. Example: If A,B and C run for both president and vice president, you can vote for A for president, and A & B for vice president. If A wins the presidency, we will use B as your VP vote, if B or C wins the presidency we will use your A for your VP vote.
This concept allows you to vote in the same capacity as if you were present at the event. The write-ins will allow you to vote for somebody that you may expect to be added to the ballot at the event (and nominate them), even if they aren't on the nominating committee's slate of nominees.
More information on email voting will be posted in a few days. Why the delay? I will be looking for volunteers of people who are NOT on the current BOD, NOT running for office, but ARE coming to the swap to be a non-biased source of vote counting. We will setup a special email account with a NCPARS.org address that will be automatically forwarded to all of the people counting the votes. The volunteers will be free to do whatever they feel they need to do to ensure all the votes are counted for. They will also be part of vote counting at the event. I will start another thread about the volunteers so don't reply here.
The choice to do e-voting in this manor was also agreed upon unanimously by the BOD present at the meeting. We also talked about some other issues pertaining to the event (and the election) that are still being hammered out but they do not affect the e-voting or who can vote.
Bottom line......
If you want to vote in the upcoming election you MUST have your 2006 dues paid by 5/5/2006. If you want to e-vote and you have not mailed in your 2006 dues and you did not purchase your 2006 membership at the last 2005 swap you will need to send your check in IMMEDIATELY. We will require a post-mark of Friday May 5th, 2006. We do realize that this means we may not get your check until after the swap, but if you make a promise to us that your dues were sent, we will accept your email vote prior to receiving your dues. We didn't want this last second approval of e-voting to seem unfair because you only have 1 or 2 days to send a check in hopes that the mail service gets it to us on time. We're giving you 5 days...the last 5 days before the swap regardless of the speed of standard mail..and a promise from you that the dues were sent.
Keep in mind that if we have too many people whose checks don't make it here in time, but their votes do, we may need to delay the official announcement of the new BOD since we MUST have your dues before your vote is official. We don't want to open ourselves up to potential voter fraud. Hopefully it won't matter...we'll know at the event. So if you want to vote, please try to get your dues to us by Friday.
Also Keep in mind that e-voting is ONLY for the people NOT attending the swap. If you are attending the swap you can pay for your 2006 dues at the door. Those of you who paid your 2006 dues at the last 2005 swap, you're already set. You'll need to fill in new contact information at the door, but you're already paid for the year and part of the vote.
Look for a post here on RC in the next day or two for e-voting procedures. We'll post it as soon as our volunteers are selected.
Thank you for your support in the upcoming election, and good luck to the nominees! If you have any concerns we can address them here or through private message (or email).
Thanks again.
--Kevin Fizz
--President, NCPARS
