In Store Voting Debuts This Year
Last year Co-op Owners voted on a bylaw amendment to permit additional methods of voting for the Board of Directors and bylaw amendments. With the cost of mailing ballots to our 6,000 owners going up all the time, this year Ukiah Natural Foods joins the majority of co-ops in switching to in-store voting. Here's how it will work.
During the month of March, a computer and a printer will be set up at Customer Service. Each Co-op owner will be able to sign into the computer, using your owner number. As a form of identity verification, you will be asked to provide the first three characters of the last name of the primary account owner. For example, Jane Public would enter "PUB".
Your mailing address will also be displayed, so you can have Customer Service correct it if necessary.
A blank ballot will be printed within 10 to 15 seconds. It's a very simple ballot this year. We have five candidates for three seats on the board, so you just have to mark up to three of the five check boxes. Then you put your ballot in the ballot box.
Owners unable to come to the Co-op for in-store voting in March may e-mail membership@ukiahcoop.com or call Gayle Scherrer or Anne Wright at 467-9712 to receive a paper ballot.
Candidate statements are posted in this issue, on our website at ukiahcoop.com and will also be available at Customer Service. A postcard will go out soon to owners for whom we have a correct address, reminding you of the new voting procedure.
We want to emphasize that you will NOT be voting on the computer. We are using paper ballots. The computer program is merely to assure that only one ballot is issued to each owner.
If you have any questions please e-mail the Elections Committee Chair, Lorena Evans at loredeoaxaca@gmail.com, or Board President Cliff Paulin at cpaulin@mcn.org.
