voting

[Guest j fox]

In our election of officers we hold a ballot vote. Some people vote by absentee ballot. When we have a tie vote in the election

we vote again only the people present at meeting get to vote. The absentee ballots are discarded with the first set of ballots.

The absentee ballots are added in the ballot box with members coming to vote, to try to keep some secrecy to ballots. Is this normal?

Or should you hold the absentee ballots seperate to be counted again in the second voting round?

[jstackpo]

Not much is correct at all...

First: absentee voting is not proper unless you authorize it in you bylaws. Do you?

If you do, the bylaws should include rules for what you do in case of ties -- RONR has none because RONR doesn't deal with absentee votes.

Personal note: Seems to me that if there is a tie then you will have to call on the absentees to vote again just as you call on the members - otherwise they, the absentees, have just lost the right to vote. You have NO assurance that they would vote the same way second time around after the tie was announced - but that is what you assume by re-using their ballots.

This, obviously, means that you can't finish the election in one meeting. Too bad! That is one of the consequences of allowing absentee voting.

[hmtcastle]

Is this normal?

It may be normal, but it ain't right. Absentee and "in-person" ballots should never be combined (for the very problems you're now facing).

[Gary Novosielski]

In our election of officers we hold a ballot vote. Some people vote by absentee ballot. When we have a tie vote in the election

we vote again only the people present at meeting get to vote. The absentee ballots are discarded with the first set of ballots.

The absentee ballots are added in the ballot box with members coming to vote, to try to keep some secrecy to ballots. Is this normal?

Or should you hold the absentee ballots seperate to be counted again in the second voting round?

Well, you should not mix the absentee ballots with the votes of present members for a number of reasons, such as the one you mentioned.

But it would also be wrong to count the absentee ballots again a second time if nobody gets a majority. (And a tie vote isn't the only way that can happen.)

The point of a second (or subsequent) ballot is to give people the opportunity to change their minds, after learning the result of the previous vote.

[Josh Martin]

Is this normal?

More normal than the members of this forum would like, unfortunately.

Or should you hold the absentee ballots seperate to be counted again in the second voting round?

No. You shouldn't combine absentee ballots with ballots cast at a meeting to begin with. Either everyone should vote at the meeting, or everyone should vote absentee. No mixing and matching.

[Trina]

No. You shouldn't combine absentee ballots with ballots cast at a meeting to begin with. Either everyone should vote at the meeting, or everyone should vote absentee. No mixing and matching.

Just to elaborate slightly on Mr. Martin's answer -- what he says above is a summary of the strong recommendation printed in RONR. However, if your bylaws say you are supposed to mix and match, you're stuck with that until you fix the bylaws. As Mr. Stackpole pointed out earlier, if the bylaws allow the combination of absentee and in-person voting, the bylaws are responsible for sorting out the messy details.