Write-In Candidate Voting

Our annual membership meeting during which votes are counted for Board of Directors will be held in a couple weeks. Our By-Laws require that members declare their candidacy by May 18th so that their bios can be published in our newsletter and in our ballots along with their names. The ballots were mailed out June 9th (today) and at the last minute and undeclared candidate want to ask members to write her name in the ballot. Our By-Laws do not specifically allow write-ins but states that the ballot must contain the names of all candidates. We do allow absentee ballots but not proxies in AZ. We were wondering whether we should allow write-in candidates, especially since all the deadlines have passed which only takes away votes from declared candidates. Any information particulary pertaining to HOA planned communities would be helpful.

I think this answers your question. You should instead warn all residents that bother writing in her name that the vote will be wasted as she is not eligible to run for office.

Explain that this is nothing personal, but that you have a duty to enforce the rules as written.

Susan,

He said his documents specifically state that one must declare candidacy by May 18th. This being the case, the write ins must be ignored.

Susan,

Googling this topic then stating one of the best answers pertains to CA does no good to Bob who's located in AZ. As I stated earlier, this would be a violation of AZ law! Also a violation of AZ law is nominations from the floor. But, you are right about one thing, "If anyone complains, this could go to court," although I doubt that most members are up on AZ law.

Mary,
Please let me the the statute as it is crucial to know in our situation.
Thanks,
Bob

I will also agree with Mary that both write-ins and floor nominations should NOT be allowed in Arizona. I believe there is also another law that comes into play which basically states that all members (annual meeting) must be allowed to vote for or against anything that is being decided. If someone puts a write in candidate on, no one will know about it and thus can't vote for or against that person. Same goes with floor nominations. The people who voted absentee would not have the opportunity to vote for or against that person.

Also it doesn't seem fair that a person who votes absentee would not see all the people running. When there are just a few candidates and the same number of open positions, then I would not be able to choose a better person if it were a write in.

Given all that, we went through this process and our legal counsel said it was ok for both. I disagreed and lost out. As it turned out, 2 people were elected by write in ballots and I am told they only got 1 vote each. One was very upset someone put his name on and the other was one of the people who strongly objected to allowing write-in candidates.

I don't think it is legal and I don't think it is fair.