The Board of Trustees extends its congratulations to the new Officers of VOTF and its gratitude to all those who put themselves forward as candidates for these very important positions. We call upon the entire membership to support Dan Bartley, Janet Hauter, Kevin Connors, and Julie McConville as they assume their new leadership positions on March 15, 2008.
We are particularly appreciative of the contributions of the members of the Nominating and Election Committees that we appointed to oversee this election. Both committees improved the processes utilized in the last election, and we especially applaud the use of the Internet to provide opportunities for members to “meet” the candidates.
The election was highly-spirited and generated considerable energy as well as some contentiousness. We received almost 200 comments from voters who opted to submit comments; most were favorable, some were not. We also received a number of complaints and concerns from members regarding a variety of matters, such as voter eligibility and equal access of the candidates to members’ email addresses. In addressing them, we attempted to strike a fair balance among the interests of the candidates, members, and the overall interests of VOTF.
As with the last two elections, VOTF contracted with a third-party vendor (Campus Vote) to conduct a secure electronic election and to certify the results. Campus Vote conducts similar elections for a variety of organizations, including academic institutions.
As part of its security procedures, Campus Vote conducts an audit of the voting logs to validate all votes cast. Campus Vote found 26 invalid votes among the 2088 total cast and its certification shows 2062 valid votes. The keen interest in the outcome of this election led the Board to request the Election Committee to report the results of the election by noon on the day after the election closed. At that time neither the Committee nor the Board was aware that invalid votes had been cast and were included in the totals reported by the Election Committee. Please see the final certified results below.
The Board is committed to review not only the concerns about invalid votes but also the various complaints and concerns raised during the course of the election, and to report its findings to the membership. As in past elections, we will rely on a report of the Elections Committee as part of this review, but we will also engage the services of an independent expert to review the circumstances relating to how the invalid votes were cast.
The Board has voted to accept the certified vote totals reported by Campus Vote and validate the election of Dan Bartley as President, Janet Hauter as Vice-President, Kevin Connors as Treasurer, and Julie McConville as Secretary, effective March 15, 2008.
On behalf of the Board of Trustees,
Bill Casey, Chair
