[PDB-gov] Vote collection and counting

[Chris Caputo]

Dave,

As we navigate the minefield of differing viewpoints, the overriding goal 
here is legitimacy.  I am motivated to run this election in a manner which 
will not be challenged by reasonable people.  Thus I want to make sure you 
and anyone else are satisfied with the fairness and openness of the 
process.

In regards to my conflict of interest, it is important to repeat to all 
here, members and candidates, that a future Board may choose to pay me for 
organizational and/or financial services.  I am motivated to do a good and 
honest job, both because it is the right thing to do, and because it may 
reflect well on me in the eyes of a future Board.  I also understand that 
I may not be retained, regardless of how well this process goes.

The plan I negotiated between Richard Turkbergen, Patrick Gilmore, Aaron 
Hughes and Matthew Griswold, as part of having an open election, is to 
have ballots go to secretary at peeringdb.com, with the alias being staffed 
by Richard Turkbergen, Patrick Gilmore, and myself.

The benefit of having multiple parties receive the secretary@ emails is to 
provide an auditing mechanism.

An issue has been raised in regards to Patrick receiving the emails, since 
Patrick has also declared for the Board.  (He is one of the nine present 
candidates.)

Patrick has agreed to be removed from secretary@, and that removal has 
been completed.

That means that both Richard Turkbergen (née Richard Steenbergen, the 
original creator of PeeringDB) and myself will receive the votes.

In regards to use of BigPulse or other voting services...

Keep in mind that an issue we have is that each vote will need to be 
carefully checked to make sure that organizations are not duplicate 
voting.  In additional each voter will need to be checked against the 
PeeringDB database to make sure they match the member definition of 
representing an active PeeringDB account.

I have experience running Board elections by hand, with a spreadsheet, and 
am confident in my ability to do so.  I do not have experience in setting 
up a BigPulse or other electronic voting service for a Board election, and 
would be leery of screwing it up, thus destroying the progress we have 
made.  I am concerned that a 3rd party runs the same risk.

In the future Matthew believes he will be able to integrate voting into 
the website itself, so that these issues are handled and vote tabulation 
is automated, but we do not have that for this election.  Hopefully it 
will be tested and in place for the proposed April election.

Chris

On Fri, 6 Nov 2015, Dave Temkin wrote:
> Chris,
>
> Given there's a proposed commercial relationship between you and PDB, 
> made by people up for election, wouldn't you call that a Conflict of 
> Interest?
> 
> Why not BigPulse, with a disinterested party a la most elections committees? 
> 
> -Dave
> 
> On Fri, Nov 6, 2015 at 8:14 PM, Chris Caputo <secretary at peeringdb.com> wrote:
>       Hi Anna,
> 
>       That will be me, per:
> 
>         http://lists.peeringdb.com/pipermail/pdb-gov/2015-October/000013.html
> 
>       Thanks,
>       Chris
> 
>       On Fri, 6 Nov 2015, Anna Claiborne wrote:
>       > Hello
> 
>       > Who will be the responsible party for collecting and counting the votes
>       > in the upcoming PDB election? I wasn’t able to find any reference for
>       > this on https://www.caputo.com/pdb/ in the election statement or bylaws.
>       > Apologies if I missed it and it is stated somewhere.
>       >
>       > -Anna