CIVIC ASSOCIATION ARTICLES; CHADDS FORD POST 11-16-06 Editorial Altman should resign 11/16/2006 Members of the Chadds Ford Civic Association should call for the immediate resignation of Marc Altman as their president or abandon any pretext that their association intends to be nonpartisan.
They should also invalidate his recent re-election as member of the board of directors and root out any other board member who improperly influenced the association's recent election.
The results of the election for six board of director seats were changed last Wednesday when 47 proxy ballots were ordered to be counted after the 64 in-person ballots cast showed the election of one Democrat among five Republicans. The Democrat had been recommended for election by the association's nominating committee.
The proxies, handed out Tuesday by Republicans in front of the polling place at St. Cornelius during the general election, contained the names of only six of the 10 candidates seeking election to the association's board. The six names were all Republicans. Four Democrats were omitted from the proxies.
Using proxy ballots is unprecedented in civic association history. The practice is not authorized by the association's bylaws and should therefore not be used, according to Roberts Rules of order.
Prior to the vote last week, Mr. Altman spoke about the need for the civic association to live up to its goal of being nonpartisan, yet Mr. Altman was one of the people handing out the Republican only proxies Tuesday.
It is also rumored that another Republican official and member of the Civic Association board of directors was telling people who attended the group's annual membership meeting to ignore the recommendation of the association's nominating committee and vote only for the first six names on the ballot distributed that night. Those six names were the same six Republicans listed on the unauthorized proxy ballots.
This is an affront to the integrity of the majority members of the association, those with a sense of goodwill and true nonpartisan civic spirit.
As it stands now, the association is grossly partisan. How could it be otherwise since seven of the 11 members of the board of directors are either Republican Party officers or members of that party's advisory board?
Civic Association members must take control of their organization from the reigning political party. They can do so by amending their bylaws to prohibit officers and board members of any political party from being a member of the Civic Association's board of directors.
Short of that, the bylaws should require equal representation from all political parties operating within the township.
The first option will work to make the association nonpartisan; the second would make it multi-partisan. Either option is preferable to the current status.
Mr. Altman's words and actions before, during and after last week's election reflect poorly on the organization. The disparity between his words and his actions do nothing to dispel the long-held belief in Chadds Ford that the Civic Association is nothing more than the handmaiden and social wing of the Republican Party.
Without change, the Chadds Ford Civic Association should not be considered anything other than a Republican organization that places party above principle. ©Chadds Ford Post 2007 Proxy votes skew Civic Association election By:Richard Schwartzman 11/16/2006 An unannounced and unprecedented inclusion of 47 proxy ballots with an incomplete list of candidates altered the course of the Chadds Ford Civic Association election, keeping a Democrat from a seat on the Board of Directors of the self-declared nonpartisan group.
Proxy voting is not authorized in the civic association's bylaws and, as such, should not be used, according to Roberts Rules of Order. It calls into question the validity of the election and conduct of some board members.
"This is stuffing the ballot box," said Lynn Jarke, an association member who helped count the ballots along with Sandy Paul. "I no longer want to be a part of this association. I'm ashamed of it."
In a series of e-mails four days after the election, Jarke withdrew her comment about leaving the association, saying she spoke out of anger.
"While I am disappointed in the actions of some of the members, I still feel the civic association has an important role to play in keeping Chadds Ford a wonderful place to live... However, after thinking it over and talking with Marc [Civic Association President Marc Altman,] I have decided to remain a member," she wrote.
Proxy voting, something Altman doesn't recall ever happening before with the group, made up 40 percent of the total number of votes and kept a Democrat, Rob Porter, from winning a seat on the board even though the nominating committee recommended him for election.
"I was disappointed that voters filling out proxies were not made aware of all the candidates on the ballot, as that seems contrary to common fairness," Porter said after the meeting.
A proxy vote authorizes one member to vote on behalf of another, a form of power of attorney. One prominent Republican in the township, speaking on condition of anonymity, said it was the first time the civic association used proxy voting.
The election for six members of the 11-member board of directors took place last Wednesday night, the day after the national general election that saw Democrats regain control of the U.S. House of Representatives and U.S. Senate.
Ballots with 10 names for six positions were handed out to Civic Association members. After those 64 ballots were counted, Porter and five Republicans including Altman running for re-election were thought to have been the winners.
However, that changed when Altman and fellow board member Donald Weiss, after a private conversation, said 47 proxy ballots listing only the six Republican candidates had to be counted as well.
Peter Jesson, chairman of the Chadds Ford Democratic Party was not surprised at what happened.
"I expected that," he said the day after the meeting. "Their day will come. They, the Republicans, are trying every trick in the book to keep control of the group."
Other Democrats omitted from the proxies were John Newport, Matt Wrabley and Gregg Lindner.
Altman, who is also a member of the Republican Party Advisory Board, said the association had nothing to do with the proxies, that some members passed them out on their own.
"It was neighbor handing them out to neighbor," he said.
Altman also said he had heard there was to be another set of proxies intended to have him fail in a re-election bid.
"The association and Marc Altman in particular," Altman said, "have tried to avoid making this a partisan issue. All we do is clean streets and throw a party for the community once a year."
Yet Altman knew about the proxies before the election. Two sources, speaking on condition of anonymity told the Chadds Ford Post that Altman himself was handing out the proxies in front of the polling place at St. Cornelius Church Tuesday during the general election.
One of the sources said Altman was almost insistent and "pressured" the source to sign the proxy.
"Now I know why he was so eager to have us sign the proxies," one of the sources said.
When asked if he was handing out proxies on Tuesday, Altman said he had asked two of his neighbors whom he hadn't seen on the street.
The two sources who spoke to the Post were not his neighbors.
When asked if he had handed proxies to anyone else, Altman said, "I spoke to so many people I honestly don't know."
Altman said Roberts Rules of Order allow proxies and that Jesson told him that unless Roberts Rules of Order were applied to the election there could be a lawsuit.
Jesson flatly denied making such a threat. He said the subject never came up during a conversation he had with Altman and Donald Weiss, another board member, regarding resume submissions and dues status for candidates.
"I have never threatened court action," Jesson said in an e-mail response. "Knowing what I know about the whole web of events, I can see how they may be very worried about the possibility. I had a meeting with Marc and Donald Weiss (acting as his attorney). When they failed to budge on the two points: dues disqualifying people and candidates from the board seeking re-election not having submitted their resumes, I simply told them the meeting was over. Litigation was never mentioned at any point."
While different people supposedly created the proxies, each of the proxies had the same six names, leading Jarke to make her claim of ballot stuffing. Altman said the proxies were not designed as absentee ballots, and that Jarke was confused by that fact.
According to Roberts Rules of Order, "Proxy voting is not permitted in ordinary deliberative assemblies unless ... the bylaws of the organization authorize it, since proxy voting is incompatible with the essential characteristics of a deliberative assembly. As a consequence, the answers to any questions concerning the correct use of proxies ... must be found in the provisions of the law or bylaws which require or authorize their use." (See www.robertsrules.com/faq.html#10 for full text.)
Roberts also refers to proxy voting as being "in conflict with the idea of the equality of members." (www.rulesonline.com/start.html#rror-08.htm)
There are no provisions for use of proxy voting in the civic association bylaws, nor are there provisions for absentee voting.
Of the 11 current members of the civic association board of directors, seven are either officers of the Chadds Ford Republican Party or are members of that party's advisory board.
They include Altman and Weiss, along with Mary Kot, Valerie Hoxter, Kathleen Goodier, Paul Koch and Gary Scheivert.
©Chadds Ford Post 2007 |