CHN Governance
2020 Corbett Heights
Neighbors Annual Board Election Procedures
Approved
April 8, 2020
These procedures are keyed
to the Bylaw amendments approved by the Board March 11, 2020, which remain
pending approval of the membership.
VOTER ELIGIBILITY
1. Under the bylaws, the election of Board
Members takes place annually at the “Annual General Membership meeting.” Board members are elected for 1-year terms and
begin serving at the close of the Annual General Membership meeting at which
they are elected.1 The date of the “Annual General Membership
meeting” shall be announced and posted on the website at the beginning of each
calendar year.
All officers are selected annually by the newly
elected Board1 at a later time.
2. To be eligible to vote, households must be
qualified per the bylaws: they must live or own property or a business within
the boundaries listed and have been a paid member for a minimum of 90 days. The
last day to become a member household eligible to vote in the Board elections shall
be determined by the date of the Annual General Membership meeting and
announced and posted on the CHN website no later than 120 days prior to that
meeting.
By historical practice, only one vote may be
exercised by each eligible member household.
BOARD CANDIDATE ELIGIBILITY
3. The bylaws specify that the Board shall
consist of no less than 3 members and no more than 12.1
The number of Board seats for each coming year
shall be determined by the Board. In the absence of any contrary announcement
by the Board, the number of seats shall be 12. In the event there are fewer
than 12 qualified Board candidates who declare their intention to run by the deadline
(see below), the number of Board seats shall be the same number as there are
candidates.
4. Prior to 2019, the
Board put forth most/all names of Board candidates. However, the current as
well as the prior bylaws also provides/provided for the submission of
additional names by any member of CHN.3
Any member of CHN may submit their or another’s
name as a candidate for election to the Board.1 Pursuant to the
bylaws, names nominated for election to the CHN Board are required to be
submitted to the Secretary, in writing, no later than 30 days prior to the
election.1 The last date to submit a name in nomination shall be
determined by the date of the Annual General Membership meeting and shall be announced
and posted on the CHN website no later than 120 days prior to the General
Membership meeting.
5. As provided by the bylaws, in order to be
eligible for nomination, an individual must be a member and eligible to
vote. Therefore, any Board candidate must have been a member for at least
90 days prior to his or her nomination and have at least one of the three
stated associations with a location within CHN’s
boundaries, as listed in the then current bylaws.1
The latest possible date for a Board candidate to
join shall be determined by the date of the Annual General Membership meeting
and announced and posted on the CHN website no later than 120 days prior.
6. No person who has
declared their candidacy to be a member of the Board may be disqualified from
appearing on the ballot unless they 1) do not meet the requirements stipulated
in the bylaws to qualify as a voting CHN member, or 2) fall under an excluded
category listed below.
Eligibility shall be
determined by the Secretary and the Treasurer, based solely upon
the factual evidence relevant to 1) the date the member joined and/or 2) the true location of their primary residence,
the lot(s) to they own or business of which they are the owner and/or, if
applicable, 3) whether the candidate is known to fall into an excluded category
listed below. In the event the two officers cannot agree, the determination
shall be made by a simple majority vote of the total number of Board members
then holding office. In the absence of such majority vote the candidate shall
be disqualified.
Excluded Categories:
1.
Only one person per member household may hold a
Board seat at any one time. Partners, wives, husbands and roommates/housemates are
prohibited from serving simultaneously. In the event, despite this prohibition,
a nomination which could cause this provision to be violated is received, the
first nomination received by the Secretary via written communication shall take
precedence over any subsequently received. Those subsequently received shall be
deemed ineligible.
A decision by the Secretary and Treasurer to
qualify or disqualify a candidate may be appealed to the full Board by the proposed
candidate or by any member. The Board, at their discretion, may consider the
Appeal, in which case they may overrule the Secretary and Treasurer’s decision.
Alternatively, it may choose to not consider the Appeal.
All decisions, procedural and substantive,
shall be determined by a simple majority of Board members then holding office.
7. Candidates for Board membership are
encouraged to submit a statement to the Secretary of up to 200 words, which shall
be distributed by the Board to eligible member households in conjunction with
the distribution of ballots. At the discretion of the Secretary and Treasurer,
statements in excess of 200 words may be returned to the candidate for revision
or will be shortened by eliminating every word following the 200th.
Their decision shall be final.
BALLOTING
8. Pursuant to the bylaws, the Board Secretary,
or his designee under the Secretary’s supervision (“designee”), shall prepare a
ballot and distribute to eligible member households in advance of the General
Membership meeting. The Secretary, or the designee if any, shall also prepare a
ballot for eligible members in attendance at the General Membership meeting,
who have not voted in advance.
Eligibility to
receive a ballot shall be determined by the Secretary and the Treasurer, based
solely upon the factual evidence relevant to 1) the date the household or
member joined and 2) the true location of its/their primary residence, the
lot(s) they own or business of which they are the owner. In the event the two
officers cannot agree, the determination shall be made by a simple majority
vote of the total number of Board members then holding office. In the absence
of such majority vote the household or member shall be disqualified.
A decision by the Secretary and Treasurer to
qualify or disqualify a household for voting purposes may be appealed to the
full Board by the affected household or by any member. The Board, at its
discretion, may consider the Appeal, in which case it may overrule the
Secretary and Treasurer’s decision. Alternatively, it may choose to not consider
the Appeal.
All decisions, procedural and substantive,
shall be determined by a simple majority of Board members then holding office.
9. Ballots shall be distributed at least 10
days in advance of the General Membership meeting.
10. Nominees shall be listed alphabetically on
the ballot by surname.
11. Ballots may be distributed initially to all
eligible members electronically, by email. Paper ballots shall be available at
the General Membership meeting for any eligible member who has not voted by
email. Any member may request to receive a paper ballot in lieu of the
electronic ballot. Should any such request be received, such paper ballot shall
be issued pursuant to a written standardized procedure and controls established
and announced by the Secretary.
12. To be counted, official ballots received by
eligible member households in advance of the General Membership meeting, must
be returned directly by the household to the Secretary via the means specified
in the balloting instructions by no later than noon the day of the General
Membership meeting or as otherwise stated in the balloting materials. Any executed ballot received by the Secretary
from a third party, or otherwise in contradiction of balloting instructions,
shall be so identified upon receipt and is subject to disqualification, at the
discretion of the Secretary.
A decision by the Secretary to disqualify a
ballot may be appealed to the full Board by the affected household or by any
member. The Board, at its discretion, may consider the Appeal, in which case it
may overrule the Secretary’s decision. Alternatively, it may choose to not
consider the Appeal.
All decisions, procedural and
substantive, shall be determined by a simple majority of Board members
then holding office.
No more than one vote may be cast for any one candidate
by any one voter.
VOTE TABULATION
13. The Secretary, and the designee, if any, shall
make every reasonable effort, which is not inconsistent with the Secretary’s responsibility
to oversee a valid election process, to avoid awareness of the preferences of
individual household voters and, in addition, until all balloting is officially
closed, knowledge of the evolving cumulative vote totals for individual
candidates.
In addition, the Secretary, and the designee,
if any, is prohibited from revealing, to any other person, any information
about the voting choice of any member or, prior to the close of all voting, any
information about the cumulative vote totals for individual candidates of which
the Secretary, or the designee, if any, may have become aware.
Willful violation of this prohibition is
grounds for the Board, if it so chooses, to remove the Secretary from office,
by simple majority vote of the members then holding office, less one: that of the
Secretary, who shall recuse themselves from any such vote.
14. The bylaws provide that voting results
shall be tallied by multiple persons at the General Membership meeting and the
results announced.1 The intention of this language is that the
results be announced at the same meeting.4
The distribution and collection of executed
ballots and any related discussion shall be the first item taken up at the Annual
General Membership meeting. Members
eligible to vote, who have not yet done so, and who are in attendance at the
meeting, may vote using a ballot distributed by the Secretary.
Once all completed ballots are received and the
vote “closed,” the ballots shall be opened and counted by the “vote counters”
who shall be named at the time election procedures and applicable dates for
that year are announced and posted on the website. These persons shall also
announce the results.
All ballots shall be counted during the meeting
in the presence of the assembled members. In no case may any partial count be
announced or disclosed to any other person prior to the deadline for receipt of
all executed ballots by the Secretary at the
membership meeting.
There shall be no limit on the number of
persons who may observe the vote tally process.
RESULTS
15. Candidates must receive a minimum of 10 votes
or 15% of the participating voters, whichever is larger, to be elected to a
Board seat.
16. In the event the number of Board candidates
receiving the minimum required number of votes exceeds the number of open Board
seats stated in the ballot instructions, the candidates deemed elected shall be
determined by those with the largest number of votes.
17. In the case of a tie vote, which would
otherwise qualify two or more candidates for a Board seat, but result in a
number of Board members exceeding that set by the Board in the Ballot
instructions but not exceeding the 12 person maximum provided for by the bylaws,
all candidates with an equal number of votes shall be deemed elected to the
Board.
(Example: The Board declares that there shall
be 10 Board seats for the upcoming year (2 less than the maximum number allowed
by the by laws). Twelve persons are nominated, 11 of which receive a number of
votes equal to or in excess of the number required to be elected, and 2 of the
11 receive the same highest number of votes. In this instance all 11 would be
deemed elected.)
In the case of a tie vote which would result in
2 or more candidates qualifying for a Board seat except for the fact that the total
Board seats may not exceed 12, the candidate eliminated shall be determined by
coin toss.
(Example: The Board declares that there shall
be 12 Board seats for the upcoming years (the maximum allowed by the by
laws). Fourteen persons are nominated,
13 of which receive a number equal to or in excess of the number required to be
elected, and two of those 13 persons receive the same number of votes, (thus,
qualifying 13 persons for Board). However, seating all would violate the
bylaw-established maximum number of Board members. In this instance, a coin
toss by the two candidates would be conducted to determine which candidate will
be eliminated.
18. Tallies and other pertinent records necessary
to enable a third party to verify the outcome shall be retained by the
Secretary for a minimum of 2 years.
TRANSPARENCY & NOTICE TO THE MEMBERSHIP
19. The bylaws require the Board to adopt
written procedures under which Board elections are conducted and post those on
the CHN website at least 90 days prior to the election. That date shall be
determined by the date of the Annual General Membership meeting and announced
and posted on the CHN website no later than 120 days prior.
AMENDMENTS TO ELECTION PROCEDURES
20. These procedures
have been designed to implement the intention of the bylaws with respect to
elections and are intended to reflect bylaw requirements to “ensure the
integrity and transparency of the nomination and election process and the
verifiability of the results.” In
adopting these procedures, the Board intends that they remain the fundamental
guiding rules for future elections, refined and amended as necessary from time
to time.
As required by the
bylaws, any future amendments should ensure (but not be limited to) the right
of members to private/“secret” ballots, provisions not serve to create
advantage for incumbents and that results are tabulated by multiple persons.
----------------------------------------------------
1CHN Bylaws adopted October 25, 2018 and
as proposed to be amended May 11, 2020
2Decision of the Board at its meeting of
March 11, 2020
3Prior bylaws adopted 2016, and replaced
by the bylaws adopted October 2018
4Interpretation of Board Bylaw Drafting
Committee Members Dresner, Koelsch & Ryser
2020 Key Board Election Related Dates
Annual General Membership Meeting to be held
September 14, 2020
May 17 Board
must announce and post final election procedures with key dates on website no
later than May 17.
May 18 To
be eligible to be a Board candidate, one must be a member in good standing no
later than May 18.
June 15 To
be eligible to vote, one must be member in good standing no later than June 15.
August 17 Candidate
names must be submitted to the Secretary no later than August 17.
August 26 Any
“Candidate Statement” must be received by the Secretary no later than August 26
to be guaranteed distribution with ballots.
September
4 Ballots shall be distributed
no later than September 4.