[802SEC] Avoiding Appeal Pain in the Future

[Mike Takefman <tak@cisco.com>]

Dear EC Members,

At the January meeting I agreed to write an email to
start discussion on the issue of elections in dot20.
The goal of this email is to be proactive so that
we have a high probability of avoiding a surge of
appeals following the March meeting.

At our EC meeting in March 2003 and at subsequent
meetings the following issues have been raised.

0) That an organization is attempting to dominate the WG.
1) To further that end, many companies sent a large number of
     voters.
2) A large number of consultants were sent to the March'03
     meeting to bolster the position of their sponsors, and the
     relationship between those consulting firms and their
     sponsors was not declared as per ANSI rules.
3) Double sign-in of voters from another other WG for the
     purpose of gaining initial membership in order to vote
     at the initial meeting.

Given the secret nature of the last election, there is no
ability to analyse the results to prove that there was
no attempt to dominate.

Given my experience in dot17 with block voting behavior
I present the following steps to restore confidence in
the election process are as follows:


a) All members must declare what company is sponsoring their
     attendance. As per ANSI rules, consultants shall declare who
     their sponsor is, or declare if their sponsor is already
     represented as a voter. Any consultants whose details are
     found to be incorrect shall not have their vote counted.

b) The members who signed into multiple groups for the March'03
     session should be subjected to the following checks and those that
     do not show clear interest and attendance in dot20 should be
     disallowed
    i)   What do they claim their interest was for that week.
         (Jerry's suggestion)
    ii)  Where possible, verify if their claimed interest is what was
         marked in their registration.
    iii) Verify their attendance at subsequent dot20 meetings and
         if possible determine if they continue to do double
         sign-ins.

c) The election shall be conducted as a role call vote and then
     the results must be analyzed to prove existence of domination.

Howard Frazier had suggested that a sub-committee be formed
(with for example the treasurer & secretary) as members to
resolve the issue of valid voters (b).

I further suggest, that a sub-committee be formed to
do the analysis of the election ballots.

I encourage Jerry to come back with his plan for insuring an
election that withstands scrutiny and appeal.

cheers,

mike