To PNB and PNB Elections Committee (Bob Lederer, please forward to all of the committee, as I don’t have the e-mail addresses for all of the non-PNB members):

This is an update of some suggestions I sent to the PNB Elections committee previously, with some additional election cost reductions and measures to ensure fairness to all candidates and so that we can have delegate elections this year even with our financial stresses, and I hope you can discuss these soon.

If you read any of the earlier versions, I suggest you read all of this, as I’ve incorporated some suggestions from other people, including ways to further reduce costs and also to speed up the process a bit, which might be especially important this year.

My main purpose here is to outline some ways we can reduce the election costs for Pacifica, while operating in accordance with our Bylaws, and being fair to all candidates.

I think we can fairly easily cut the election costs by 1/2 or more, compared to the 2012 costs, maybe more if we’re serious about it. It will require changing the way we do some things (while staying consistent with Bylaws requirements) to make significant cost reductions, though. And I realize any change makes some people uneasy. But I think we’re going to have to change the way we do some things, if we’re going to be able to afford elections for our boards.

In general, I suggest we stick with the Bylaws requirements, and not add on additional expenses that are not required, nor LES work for which we must pay, especially work that provides little benefit to members/voters but which causes a lot of problems that require significant LES and NES time to resolve and/or that cause some candidates to be treated unfairly. Some of what we do also increases distrust and real or at least perceived unfairness towards certain candidates, and sometimes lawsuits, so is also counter-productive from that point of view as well.

We should focus on the goals of the delegate elections, and see if we can achieve them at lower costs:

* recruit qualified candidates

* make candidate/voting information available to all members

* encourage member participation/voting

* encourage donations by members to pay for the elections

* be fair to all candidates

* ensure ballots are tabulated efficiently and accurately

Other non-profits that have democratically-elected boards don’t do anything like what Pacifica does with its elections. We should be thinking about how those organizations conduct elections, stick with the minimum Bylaws mandates in order to reduce costs, and be willing to do things differently than in the past.

I think the main ways to reduce election costs are to:

1. Minimize the printed information mailed to members, and instead direct members/voters to a national Pacifica elections web site for information on candidates and for voting. Mail the entire candidate pamphlets and paper ballots only to people who ask for them (opt-in to get the printed info, not opt-out). This alone is likely to save at least $40,000, especially with effective encouragement of members to get election information online and to vote electronically.

Effective on-air promotion that includes how to get candidate information online, and how to request replacement online voting credentials and printed information, should more than make up for any possible negative affect on the ability to reach quorum caused by not sending the printed candidate information to everyone. People tend to put aside their printed election packet until they have more info on the candidates, anyway, and sometimes lose them. By making it quick and easy to request replacement online voting credentials or printed ballots, we might have an increase in the number of members voting.

Fewer mail-in return ballots will also save money because we’ve used business reply mail envelopes (where Pacifica pays the postage when they are used) in order to encourage people to return their ballots.

Note that we have never had all of the candidate information in the printed information. The complete candidate information (the long version of candidate statements, and answers to candidate questionnaires) have been available online, but many members did not look there because they incorrectly assumed all (or enough) information was in the printed booklets – they did not even know about the additional info they were missing, that has only been available online.

Along with this, ensure that a secure method of online voting is provided (as many election services vendors can already do), so that when members go to the election web site for candidate information, it’s easy for them to vote online, too. This will help us with quorum.

Online election software could be open source, to largely foreclose the possibility of vendor-assisted tampering. As an example, the current price of OpenSTV for large nonprofits is $400.

Also note that online voting with a web browser with a secure (https) connection, which can be done in a manner similar to online banking, is different than e-mail voting (which is impossible to secure and should not be used). Using e-mail reminders to members is a good idea to increase voting, but these reminders should include links to the national elections web site for the actual candidate info and voting.

We should not talk about nor use e-mail voting — repeated references to this gives everyone the wrong idea, because many people know about the insecure nature of e-mail. We should instead refer to secure online voting using a web site and a secure (https) connection, which the Bylaws allow and which the PNB has voted to support.

A few years ago, we tried an opt-out strategy for getting printed information, and it did not work. Only a handful of members chose to opt out. The huge majority of members who don’t vote at all are especially unlikely to bother to respond to any request to opt out of getting the printed election info. The opt-out system cost more to set up than the trivial savings in printing and mailing achieved.

In another election (2010, I believe), we first decided to NOT mail all the candidate info with the ballots to all members (requiring them to opt-in to get the entire printed candidate info packet), but then later the PNB reversed this, requiring a second mailing with all the printed info to all members — this maximized printing and postage costs while getting the printed info to members late in the election. We don’t want to make that mistake again.

Even if everyone who votes (generally less than 15% of members, usually close to 10% for all stations except KPFA) requests hard copy candidate information by mail, an opt-in system for this would still cut printing and mailing costs by at least 75%. It’s more likely that with an explanation to members of why they should vote online (to save Pacifica money and because more information on candidates is available online), that many would do so (as other non-profits have experienced when they allow both paper mail voting and online voting), and we’d cut printing and mailing costs even more. We’d need an efficient way of handling the requests for complete printed info, and we’d need to ensure that our election services vendor could handle this. I think most can do so. In the 2012 elections, I was told that the system was not set up to promptly send out replacement ballots – this should be improved. The initial mailing to all members might just be a postcard with online voting info and authentication codes unique for each member (also with address correction requested from USPS), with a note to return it to our election services provider for people who want to get all the old-style printed info and ballot. Having unique bar codes printed on the return postcards to identify the voter/member would simplify the process and make it more reliable, plus we can also have an online printed ballot/candidate information request form that could also take care of many replacement ballot requests (with on-air carts telling everyone about this).

For security, identification codes could be sealed inside a folded postcard rather than externally visible. This would still not cost much to mail to all members, again with the postcard also having all the information needed to go online and get information about the election and candidates, and to vote. All election-related mailings and returns would be third-party or LES- or NES-supervised to prevent staff interception.

After a cutoff date when the expense of mailing new or replacement printed info packets becomes extraordinary, the option should be withdrawn and a link to the online info offered instead. After a cutoff date when the return of a mailed replacement ballot becomes unlikely, the option should be withdrawn and a link to online verification and balloting offered instead. A member who has not yet voted but able to verify their identity online either with their postcard barcode or otherwise could instantly be granted online ballot access up to the last minutes of the election, if sufficient security over the verification data in station membership records was maintained and if the verification steps were automated. Finally, if needed for last minute voters, computers could be made available at each station in the last couple of days of the ballot return period, and the LES or NES could be available at the station to verify identity and provide PIN codes for online voting at the station. If the NES or an NES assistant does this (see next section), the voting deadlines (or the in-person help noted here) could be staggered for each station so that, for example, the NES could spend two or three days at each of two stations, and an NES assistant could spend two or three days at each of the other three stations.

2. Reduce the labor costs (over half of the total election costs):

— by having nominations done only online and requiring all candidates to submit all required information (except petitions with signatures) via forms on the national Pacifica elections web site – similar to the 2012 elections, but include lessons learned from that election

— by eliminating the on-air 50-60 second candidate spots – they provide little useful information for voters, but cause a flood of complaints that LESs and NES have to deal with (see * below). Experience has shown that it’s virtually impossible to get any of the stations to play all candidate spots in a fair manner, even with good intentions by the LESs and station management. Instead, air a variety of interesting and informative carts (not mentioning individual candidates) that tell listeners why voting in our elections is important, and how to go online to get election information on all candidates and to vote.

— by having the NES and an NES assistant record all or most election information carts rather than LES’s at each station

— consider hiring only one or two part-time LESs for a limited time and only if needed (and not for the initial candidate nomination period in order to avoid further delaying the elections): It can take substantial time for the NES to recruit, review, interview, select, and train LES’s. The typically short amount of time we have allowed for NES’s to do this, before the nomination period begins, has made it difficult to find and train good LES’s, even though it takes a lot of time for the NES, and we end up with at least some of the LESs who really can’t do the job well.

— by continuing with Election Services Corp or the equivalent for ballot printing, mailing, collection, and tabulating (including secure online voting). Develop an improved way for people to request and get replacement ballots (and printed candidate info) by mail in a more prompt manner, and to accommodate members who don’t speak English well. We might extend/formalize the work-around developed near the end of the 2012 election at KPFK for this purpose.

— All audio recordings (for on-air candidate forums, if we can afford them, and recorded candidate spots that never air) would be only on a national elections web site and/or video recordings of expanded candidate statements on a site like YouTube or Vimeo, not on individual station web sites. The alternative, trying to get election information (including corrections and updates) posted correctly and timely on five different web sites, maximizes the expense and time required and in the past has resulted in not all stations’ web sites having current and correct information.

— Automate, as much as possible, the recording of candidate audio spots, without requiring LESs to schedule appointments for each candidate. This could be done, for example, by sending each candidate a phone number and code where they can leave a voicemail message with their audio message. This is similar to ringless voicemail for auto dealers and how they achieve reaching potential customers, because the power of voicemail is still evident. Instructions to the candidates will tell them the maximum length their message can be, how to listen to the recorded message to make sure it sounds OK and how to re-record it if desired, that they should have a good quality phone line for the call, that if they mess up they can call back and re-record their message, what happens if their audio recording is longer than the time limit, and the deadline for recording their message.

— Move up the deadline for replacement ballot requests — to at least 2 weeks before the ballot return deadline, to avoid the usual big crunch at the end that causes errors and sometimes the need for extensions. Of course, the replacement ballot request deadline needs to be well publicized, on the air and on the elections web site.

— Avoid extending ballot return deadlines if quorum is not likely with an extension, as this increases LES and NES costs and delays seating new LSB members, and it delays election of Directors to the PNB. It’s better to take corrective action soon if a station is not airing election announcements adequately.

* The short individual candidate spots that we air on our stations provide little useful information to members/voters. All the candidates usually sound good in them, and there is not enough time to say much in less than a minute. However, they create a great deal of extra work for LESs and often for the NES, significantly increasing Pacifica’s labor costs for elections. They also create distrust and can easily be unfair to some candidates, even if there’s no intention of discriminating for or against certain ones. It’s difficult to get cooperation from some programmers to play those carts per whatever schedule is developed, plus it’s virtually impossible to verify (at least in a reasonable amount of time) whether they’re really played per the schedule and log in a fair manner. A better alternative would be to frequently play a variety of interesting, generic carts promoting the elections but without individual candidates’ names and introductory info, but telling members how to get all the candidate and voting details online or by mail. This would also eliminate any unfairness caused by certain candidates’ carts aired more frequently or at better times than others, would make life for the LESs a lot easier, and improve trust in the election process.

To further reduce costs, we might also eliminate the on-air forums. If they are held, they should have no more than about 4-5 candidates per hour, not 8-10 per hour as was done at one station in 2012). They could be organized and hosted by the NES or NES assistant, but this might require that person to spend at least several days at each station, plus time for organizing each forum and scheduling candidates. The total number of days required would depend on the total number of candidates. Note that in the past, LES’s have had to spend a considerable amount of extra time re-scheduling when candidates asked to re-schedule their forum appearance due to sickness, work schedule, etc. So if the forums are held, this may be another issue. Even with the extra rescheduling work from the LESs, one or two candidates are often left out of the forums because they could not participate on the scheduled dates or times, so this is another reason why it might be best to eliminate them and just rely on information (text and possibly audio recordings) on the elections web site. The recordings of the forums, if held, should also be easily available online, via the Pacifica elections web site. Note that the Pacifica Bylaws do not require on-air forums, and only a fraction of members are likely to tune in to hear them. Having more (text) information online and easily accessible to all members makes it easier for members to get the information when it’s convenient for them, and would cut labor costs substantially. Again, consider how other national non-profits elect their boards — virtually all of them just rely on printed information which gives all candidates an equal chance and which can be reviewed and re-reviewed whenever is convenient for members.

Other things Pacifica needs to do to improve our elections and to cut costs:

It’s very important to get the member lists (both listener and staff) in better shape, now. This requires commitment from management at each station. Without doing this, it’s going to continue to cost significant amounts to pay LESs to try to straighten them out, plus potentially delaying ballot mailings and requiring large number of replacement ballots, thus increasing costs further because of extra effort required to verify each individual requires. Even if we want the LESs to do this, it’s still going to take staff time, especially for stations where member lists are not maintained well. If the management at each station can get the member lists updated, and keep them updated, it will help them with mailings for donations and membership renewals, as well as elections. Ideally, all we should need is for the NES to travel to each station for one day each to ensure that the proper query of the MemSys database, and volunteer and staff databases if needed, are done so that the NES can be sure that the list generated is for the members per the Bylaws definitions.

Each station’s member database should be checked for duplicates, including members with similar but not exactly the same names in the database (ex: J Smith, John Smith, John A Smith, J Anthony Smith, at the same or different addresses) — this can be only partly automated and will require some staff time, but can be done by the NES and an assistant.

An NCOA scan (using a mailing house vendor with USPS’s National Change of Address database) can check for members who have moved in the last year and provide updated addresses. Note that this does NOT require sending a mailing (at additional expense) to members. Mailing houses can do this for a small fee. (See https://www.usps.com/business/move-update.htmfor details — see “Address Service Requested” under “Ancilliary Service Endorsements”, and “NCOA Link Systems” on that USPS web page.) However, address corrections obtained must be entered into the member database for each station on an ongoing basis for this to help us, and should be done on an ongoing basis, not just before elections.

People who are in the Memsys database need to be clearly identified as either staff or listener (not both), per the definition in the Bylaws, before the nomination period closes, preferably by the beginning of the nomination period. The Bylaws createsseveral ways that people may become members, and each station should maintain a single database that includes all of them and is set up to minimize duplications. For example, we have members who have individually donated at least $25 in the last year, couples who have donated at least $50 in the last year (and who should therefore get two ballots), those who qualify by volunteering at least 3 hours under staff supervision (many of whom also are paid members), paid staff, unpaid staff represented by a collective bargaining unit, and unpaid staff not represented by an unpaid bargaining unit. Note that many of the staff members will also be in Memsys because they donate money to the station, too.

Not having the member lists for all stations in order, before the elections start, ensures problems and is probably the main source of delays and cost overruns (and sometimes lawsuits) in our elections.

Besides getting members’ names and removing duplicates, it’s also essential to get the complete postal mailing address for ALL members in each of the above categories. One example of how bad it gets: in the last election, one LES was not able to get addresses for most of the staff until nearly the end of the ballot return period. We’ll need to mail ALL members at least a postcard providing their unique authentication information for voting — either online or by requested a printed ballot/candidate info packet. We should not have to wait until after ballots are mailed to discover these problems and then to scramble, while the LESs and NES are busy with other important election matters, to determine why people are not getting ballots.

Using the online staff registry or the equivalent — a simple way of getting accurate names and contact information for all staff –should be mandatory for all staff, paid and unpaid, at all stations, and the list of staff names (without contact info) should be publicly displayed at each station so everyone can help to verify if there are names that should not be on there, or ones who are left off, BEFORE the ballots are mailed. This is also critical for knowing who should get staff ballots and who should get listener ballots. If there are any bugs or needed features in the online staff registry, these should be fixed first, before the elections.

Staff members should be merged into the Memsys database if possible, so that whenever contact information changes, or someone transitions between listener and staff categories, we don’t have to update two databases — this invites errors, inconsistencies, and duplicates.

There are other important reasons to maintain accurate member lists (for both staff and listeners), and this should be an ongoing activity, not just for elections. EVERY mailing from our stations to members, for renewals and donations, should ALWAYS request address corrections from USPS, and the corrections should be entered into the Memsys data base on an ongoing basis. If this has not already been done at least once this year at each station, it should be completed (including entry of address corrections) well before ballots are mailed. As I noted before, you don’t need to have a separate mailing to check for bad addresses — do an NCOA scan, get address corrections back and entered into the member database, and do this for EVERY mailing for donations, membership renewals, when thank-you gifts are sent, etc.

I invite comments, suggestions, and critiques.

Bill Crosier, former PNB member, former PNB Elections Committee chair