BALLOT SENT OUT W/O A WRITE-IN OPTION
Hello again ~
We received our ballots and mailed them in before realizing that the write-in option had been omitted. I asked the management company and they said yes, we certainly could write someone in, but did not address why that section was left off.
Can we go to the management company & rip up the ballots we mailed in so that we can vote again and write in a candidate who’s decided to serve? AND/OR can those of us who are voted in just nominate a homeowner who wants to serve? We have seven spaces and only six candidates.
Finally, this whole “mix up” with the ballot has to do with the HOA President who does things “her way.” However, we just turned in a petition w/ nearly half the community members’ signatures to hold an Executive Meeting to vote to have her removed. Surprisingly, she resigned effective immediately. So we’d like to return to running the community ethically/legally as has been done in the past. Which includes holding an election the way we always have – w/ the write in candidate option and/or changing out ballot the night of the election, as needed. Please clarify this, as acceptable/legal or not
Thank you for your assistance!
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Laura,
Typically, a submitted ballot is irrevocable. Was the board president that resigned on the ballot? When is the actual meeting? If the board member that resigned is on the ballot her resignation was for her current term and she could be reelected based on this ballot. The association should have provided a write in space for the 7th board position that would have provided better clarity. It is not a good practice to allow submitted ballots to be changed without a good reason, especially on the night of the election. This will cause mistakes and most likely result in miscounts. What your association should do is notify everyone that they inadvertently omitted the write in spot and allow anyone who has already submitted a ballot to send in a write in vote only for that 7th spot. This way you are not changing your vote just supplementing it for the 7th seat. If the president’s resignation included removing her from the ballot than two write in spots would need to be included to address her position as well. The easiest thing to do is to correct the ballot and resend it and have everyone that already submitted ballot to vote again and throw out all previously submitted ballots.
Dennis
Laura,
The petition for board recall is actually for a special meeting of the members to vote to recall an elected board member. Having a petition for special meeting to recall a board member coincident to an annual meeting to elect the board is counterproductive and extremely unusual and confusing for the entire community. There is no executive meeting involved. When is the annual meeting to elect the board and when was the petition submitted? This is very important and has to be clarified right away. Are the rest of the board reasonable people? We can fix all of this and do it right, if we take very deliberate steps.
Dennis