Reforming the WSFS committee elections
Jul. 26th, 2025 04:07 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
james_davis_nicollThe quoted material below is quoted material.
I wrote in 2022 that the election system used by WSFS should be changed. At present, the rules for electing the Mark Protection Committee, the body charged with ensuring that the intellectual property of WSFS is protected, are set out in Standing Rule 6.2:
Voting shall be by written preferential ballot with write-in votes allowed. Votes for write-in candidates who do not submit written consent to nomination to the Presiding Officer before the close of balloting shall be ignored. The ballot shall list each nominee’s name. The first seat filled shall be by normal preferential ballot procedures as defined in Section 6.4 of the WSFS Constitution. There shall be no run-off candidate. After a seat is filled, votes for the elected member shall be eliminated before conducting the next ballot. This procedure shall continue until all seats are filled. In the event of a first-place tie for any seat, the tie shall be broken unless all tied candidates can be elected simultaneously. Should there be any partial-term vacancies on the committee, the partial-term seat(s) shall be filled after the full-term seats have been filled.
I warned that this carries the risk that a single faction with roughly half of the total votes could win every single seat and squeeze out other viewpoints.
My warning has come dramatically true.
