Dear AMIA Members,
After careful consideration, the AMIA Board of Directors, the Elections Committee and the Elections Manual Revision Task Force have decided to use online voting to conduct the 2008 election for positions on the Board. We are sending this announcement to explain our reasons for this decision and detail the safeguards that are in place to ensure a fair and democratic election.
As some of you will remember, AMIA first used online voting during our 2006 election. Questions and concerns about this practice arose at that time due largely to the Board and Executive Director’s use of voter lists. The Elections Committee investigated the 2006 election and issued a report to all AMIA members in March 2007. In that report, the Elections Committee cited several matters that they felt needed to be addressed, among them online voting, and called for an update of the Elections Manual. It also decided to return to paper ballots for the 2007 election while the use of online voting was being looked at and reconsidered.
At the request of the Election Committee, the AMIA Board created the Elections Manual Revision Task Force to assume responsibility for the manual’s revision. In January 2008, the Elections Manual Revision Task Force began drafting a new manual; that work is continuing with a complete draft expected this fall. With the upcoming 2008 election in mind, the Task Force prioritized the issue of online voting and recently recommended to the Board and the Elections Committee that it be reinstated this year. The Board and the Elections Committee have agreed to the Task Force’s recommendation.
AMIA’s 2008 election will be conducted using the Voting on Demand online software provided by VoteNet Solutions. Voting on Demand has an excellent reputation for security and reliability, and is arguably the leading online voting system in use by small-sized organizations. More importantly, the Task Force looked at Voting on Demand specifically in light of three guiding principles:
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