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Online Voting

Some of the video conferencing solutions support virtual arm-raising, and yes/no options for quick and easy public votes within a meeting (see

Zoom⁠

), but for private, anonymous votes a more sophisticated voting method may be preferred.

Voting Guidelines for Clubs during the COVID-19 Emergency

During the pandemic, the Party and the clubs have improvised, and researched the use of easily available tools to continue to be able to meet, vote and help get Democrats elected.

For online voting the number of people present in an Audio/Video meeting, or the number of returned ballots, should be used when determining quorum.

Accessibility

Online meetings pose challenges for members who are not joining via a smartphone or computer, but using a regular phone via a dial-in number. Although Zoom supports the ability to Raise a virtual hand by pressing *9 it does not support Yes/No selections or responding to a Poll.

Clubs must be prepared to help phone participants record their vote, much as they would at an in-person meeting when a member needs help to complete a ballot.

Email voting, or voting with a code during a Zoom meeting, may help with this problem for some members, but there may be members who need assistance and clubs should ensure they have a process in place to help all of their members record their vote.

Zoom Meeting Using Raised Hand Zoom Feature

Zoom supports simple Yes/No voting, but with a recent update, the Y/N disappear after a time, which creates difficulties for tabulation. Instead, we recommend the raise hand function.

The trick is how to easily and quickly identify just the voting members during the meeting. Participants can be renamed upon entering the meeting and given an identifiable prefix, and then the list is sorted by the prefix and only the correctly prefixed members counted. This requires co-hosts to constantly monitor the members joining, and to rename them before any vote is taken. The Zoom meeting must also be configured to disable the participants’ ability to rename themselves.

Recommended Process for Zoom Yes/No Feature

Before the meeting create a Breakout room for Voting Members using a list of members' email addresses, and assign members to that room.

Move the Voting Members to that Breakout room whenever a vote is taken.

This ensures that votes are only counted from eligible voting members.

Zoom Meeting Using Zoom Polling Feature

Polling provides the ability to document votes taken, and to quickly display the percentages to the members. The vote can be anonymous with only the totals recorded, or each vote can be recorded for a public vote. Again the trick is to only present the poll to members eligible to vote.

Recommended Process for Zoom Polling Feature

Before the meeting create Breakout rooms for Voting Members and non-voting members using a list of members' email addresses and emails of those registered for the meeting, and assign participants to the appropriate room.

Move the non-Voting Members to their Breakout room whenever a poll is taken.

This ensures that polls are only taken from eligible voting members.

Note: In Zoom the participants are not forced to move to a breakout room, the option is left up to the participant, so it may be necessary to remove a participant, when using a poll.

Voting using vote.demclubs.org

⁠

vote.demclubs.org⁠

is available to all Democratic Clubs in San Diego County and can be used for Email/Zoom Meeting voting. If you’d like an account please email

john@demclubs.org⁠

The club can send each eligible member an email with a specific link that allows them to vote and only vote once. The club can tell if the member has voted, but not how they voted. (Non-anonymized voting is also supported, if required.)

⁠

vote.demclubs.org⁠

supports Ranked Choice Voting reducing the need for multiple rounds of voting, and enables members who can’t attend the meeting to vote ahead of the meeting.

If two or more members share an email address, separate emails can be sent addressed to each voting member, and each with their own link for voting.

After notice has been given of an endorsement meeting clubs can send out a

vote.demclubs.org⁠

link to those members who are qualified to vote, based on the club’s bylaws for a member in good standing. The link in the email enables members to vote either before or during the endorsement meeting.

The club can tell if the email has been received and if the member has voted. Reminders can be sent to members who have not voted.

After voting is closed, the results can be easily downloaded as CSV, PDF, Excel, Word, HTML, R (syntax, data), STATA (XML) and shared with campaign observers and independent auditors to make sure the ballots are tallied correctly.

Results can be displayed quickly with graphics and percentages clearly displayed. Clubs can also apply their own rules for thresholds and run-offs between the highest vote getters.

The underlying software (

limesurvey.org⁠

) is open source, transparent and publicly accessible.

Voting using OpaVote

Opavote can be used for email voting and/or for voting at a Zoom meeting, as OpaVote has two types of voters: email voters and code voters.

With email voters, the club sends each member an email message that has a secret link that allows them to vote and only vote once. OpaVote supports Ranked Choice Voting reducing the need for multiple rounds of voting at a meeting, and enabling members who can’t attend the meeting to vote ahead of the meeting.

With code voters, the club provides each member with a secret code before the Zoom meeting. For example, it could be emailed to each member who writes the secret code on a sticky note and attaches it to their computer screen for easy reference during the meeting. Regardless of how many votes there are at the meeting, the club member always uses their same code. When two members share one email address, the club emails two codes to that one email address.

Recommended Process for OpaVote at Zoom Meeting

Create a "Template" Election on the OpaVote management console. Give it a title that makes it clear that it is a template for the meeting and is not to be used for an election.

Add the desired number of codes to the template election.

Email each voter one code to be used during the Zoom meeting.

Then for each vote use the "Copy" button on the management console to copy the template election to a new vote. When you copy the election, OpaVote copies all of the codes as well. Do this in advance of the meeting so all your votes are ready to go when you need them. Fill in all the important information for each vote (title, candidates, etc.) but DO NOT change the code voters. Then click the "Start Voting" button so they are ready when you need them.

During the Zoom meeting, when you are ready to run a vote, you can paste the website address of the election into the Zoom meeting chat. The election address will look like this:

https://www.opavote.com/en/code/1234567890

Each participant in the Zoom meeting can click on that link to get to the voting page, type in their secret voting code, and then vote. You can do this for as many votes as you like throughout the meeting.

Recommended Process for OpaVote Email Voting

OpaVote sends an email to each club member. The emails are sent from the address

noreply@opavote.com⁠

. Clubs have two options for providing the email addresses of members:

Upload file — Upload a plain text file (i.e., ASCII) with a list of members. Be careful when using a program like Microsoft Word or Excel to make sure you are saving as plain text. The file must have one email address per line.

Enter voters — You can also copy and paste the email addresses from another source. One email address per line.

OpaVote supports Ranked Choice Voting.

Candidate Elimination — With RCV counting methods, candidates with the smallest number of votes are eliminated. This can be done in several ways.

Single — Candidates are always eliminated one at a time.

Zero — The first time that candidates are eliminated, all candidates with zero votes are eliminated simultaneously. Afterwards, candidates are eliminated one by one.

Losers — All candidates who cannot win the election are eliminated simultaneously. At a given round of counting, one can look at the distribution of votes, and determine mathematically which candidates still have a chance of winning and which candidates cannot possibly win.

Email Voting

Voting by email has the advantage that all club members are able to participate, not just those who attend the meeting. The window for voting can be much wider than the hour or two endorsement meeting. Similar to Vote by Mail ballots that are sent out one month before an election, the call for voting could be sent out along with the 14-day meeting notice with the deadline for voting at the meeting.

Recommended Process for Email Voting

(Based on the rules used by the E-Board of the SDCDP when voting by email.)

The Secretary shall serve as the Coordinator unless the Secretary is unavailable or ineligible to serve, in which case the President shall appoint another Executive Board member to serve as the Coordinator.

The Coordinator shall confirm that all members have a listed email address. If a club member does not have email access, the Coordinator shall contact the member by telephone or other means to obtain their vote.

When an email vote is called for, it need not be the exclusive means of voting. An eligible voter may choose to cast a ballot by telephone or in writing, if signed by the voter, and received by the Coordinator within the time allotted for voting.

For email voting purposes, a quorum shall be [insert your club’s existing quorum rules] and is determined as votes are received by the Coordinator.

For this purpose, a vote of "abstention" shall count as a vote cast toward the quorum. If the Coordinator does not receive a number of eligible votes equal to or greater than the quorum by the deadline for voting, the question shall fail.

The Coordinator shall use all due diligence to assure that all members eligible to vote have received notice of the vote to be taken and any information or discussion necessary to be fully informed of the matter to be voted on and the consequences of the vote.

The Coordinator shall allow a reasonable time for response of at least 7 days and make the deadline a prominent part of the call for ballot.

The Coordinator shall verify that the email vote was cast from an email address registered to an eligible club member.

The Coordinator shall not release any information prior to the final tally about the number of ballots or the nature of the votes cast except described below.

The Coordinator shall tally the votes and announce the results to the President or presiding officer if other than the President at the deadline for voting.

Club members shall not be permitted to change their votes once cast.

Comparison of Approved Online Voting Methods

Description

Pros

Cons

Recommendations

Zoom Yes/No Feature

Easy to access in Zoom meeting

Need to move members to a breakout room No audit of vote For multi-candidate races may require multiple rounds of voting Requires an officer to be familiar with Zoom

Good for informally gauging the mood of the group For formal votes other methods are preferable

Zoom Polling Feature

Easy to run in Zoom meeting Record of vote Percentages calculated immediately

Need to move non-voting members to a breakout room For multi-candidate races may require multiple rounds of voting Requires an officer to be familiar with Zoom

Good for recording a vote at a meeting if only voting members are present in the virtual room

⁠

vote.demclubs.org

⁠

Allows entire membership to vote easily, not just those present at the meeting Members who share an email address can vote individually Also supports voting during a Zoom meeting Supports RCV/IRV, plurality and other voting methods No cost to the club regardless of the number of members, candidates, or number of endorsement meetings held

Requires an officer to be familiar with survey tools

Best solution for including all the voting members, providing an audit, downloadable ballots, automatically calculating RCV/IRV, and supporting alternative thresholds and ballot formats

OpaVote

Requires an officer to be familiar with OpaVote tool $ cost of the tool depends on the number of members and number of candidates for each endoresement meeting.

Provides solution for including all the voting members, providing an audit, downloadable ballots, automatically calculating RCV/IRV, and supporting alternative thresholds and ballot formats

Email voting

Allows entire membership to vote easily, not just those present at the meeting Most members are familiar with email

Requires an officer to keep track of all the emails sent and received

Most time consuming and prone to error, least preferred

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⁠

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