Issue link: http://digital.copcomm.com/i/340001
Do You Support Electronic Voting? EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR'S MESSAGE by WEA Executive Director Ron Sniffin SUMMER 2014 | wyoea.org 5 The 81st Delegate Assembly in April of 2013 voted to "pilot" electronic voting for Wyoming Education Association elections. Since then, we have conducted two elections, with mixed results. This past April, the delegates of the 82nd Delegate Assembly voted to explore the election process within the WEA. One component of that is to review the piloting of the electronic voting. From my observation, I believe there are many positives to electronic voting, and one major negative – lack of voter turnout. Positives: Quick turn-around – Once the election window is closed, the results are compiled within 24 hours. With a traditional paper ballot, it takes nearly three weeks before the results can be announced because we allow: 10 days for the locals to count ballots 6 days for mailing 2 days to count and certify Turnaround is a huge issue in relation to the NEA Representative Assembly. Many on the ballot are running to be delegates to NEA-RA. NEA requires ALL delegates' names to be submitted by May 15 th . Because of WEA bylaws directing when the WEA elections must be held, it has been extremely close to get names to NEA before the deadline. NEA is also getting much more strict with their deadlines. Far less staff time required – Printing paper ballots, coordinating distribution and organizing volunteers to count paper ballots take a tremendous amount of staff time. While some of these tasks continue with electronic voting, much of it is eliminated. Far less volunteer time required – With a traditional paper ballot, we rely on volunteers at the local to distribute, retrieve, and verify ballots. Once sent to the Cheyenne office, we depend on a team of 12 retired volunteers to spend up to a day tabulating ballots by hand. Reduced margin for error – While we have had a very competent group of volunteers assisting with the paper-ballot elections, there is more opportunity for error when dealing with paper ballots. For example, in years past we have had the unfortunate situation of disallowing an entire local's ballots because of an error in tabulating the information before sending it to the WEA office. Increased voter autonomy We know that many members are not familiar with the candidates who are running for WEA offices. With electronic voting, we provided links to Presidential and Vice-Presidential candidates' DA speeches and links to all candidates' biographies. Cost When comparing the expense of hiring an outside vendor to conduct an electronic election to the cost of staff time, paper, postage, etc., for a paper ballot election, the cost to conduct each election is roughly the same. However, the time savings by staff, and potentially volunteers, allows them to work on other tasks since they are not spending the time on elections. Negatives: Low Voter Turnout The one BIG negative we have experienced so far with electronic voting has been low voter turnout. The first election held last October was for constitution and bylaws amendments that changed the terms of office of the president, vice president and treasurer from two- year terms (maximum three terms) to three-year terms (maximum two terms), as well as cleanup of some language throughout both documents. Only 271 people voted in this election. We believed the lack of voter engagement may have contributed to the low turnout. We applied what we learned from that first electronic election to the WEA election in April. We encouraged local leaders and ARs to urge members to vote. We sent local leaders posters to share. We promoted get-out-the-vote activities during Delegate Assembly. We e-mailed members multiple times, instead of just once, reminding them to vote. While a much better turnout than our first electronic election, the turnout was still low. Here is a comparison of the last three elections: 2014 was electronic, 2012 and 2010 were paper: During this past Delegate Assembly, there was much debate on this topic. The vast majority voted to continue with electronic voting. However, the delegates also voted to create an ad- hoc committee to review the entire election process. As part of this committee's efforts to gather information, I am asking you for input. We have created a survey that we hope will provide this committee information to determine how best to conduct future WEA elections. However, asking you to complete a survey may be even more difficult than asking you to vote. Therefore, we are attempting to entice you to complete the survey by submitting your name in a raffle with a chance to win one of five $100 American Express gift cards. But, more important than the chance to win $100, we hope you will complete the survey so we can determine how to best move the WEA election process forward. VOTER TURNOUT COMPARISON ELECTRONIC PAPER PAPER Year 2014 2012 2010 Eligible Voters 5832 5938 6277 Votes Cast 1012 2745 2417 % 17.35% 46.23% 38.51% SEE THE SURVEY DETAILS ON PAGE 6 ICI WEA.indd 7 6/26/14 3:20 PM