Do to procedural challenges made to the AFT National office by one of the members of
our Local, I regret to inform you that the AFT Officer and Delegate elections
that commenced this morning have been suspended effective immediately. I know
that many of you have voted already and I apologize for the inconvenience.
Although we provided ample notice of the election by e-mail, AFT legal staff have informed
us that, to comply with Federal election law, we must provide notice in a paper
mailing, sent to the last known home address of each member. Because a
large-scale paper mailing is not only labor intensive, but also costly, we
chose the more cost-effective means of notice by e-mail. Unfortunately, in
response to the challenge, we must prepare and send notification by postal
mail.
The use of the
ELVIS system to record votes has also been challenged. In exercising due legal
caution, AFT National Legal staff have required that we provide verification of
the security and anonymity of ELVIS in recording votes. The election committee
has reached out to OIT to help us in presenting the specifications of ELVIS. In
the event that the specifications of ELVIS cannot be documented to the satisfaction
of AFT legal staff, we may be forced to conduct the election by paper ballot.
It should be
noted that the above objections, and others not sustained by the AFT legal
staff, were never made to Local Election Committee and were not presented to the
National AFT until the well-publicized election was underway. Therefore, we
were not able to address the objections before-the-fact. Moreover, AFT National
Legal staff have determined that there was ample opportunity for anyone to
declare candidacy and secure a nomination. Hence, no additional names will be
added to the ballot, even as we are required to re-run the election.
It is going to
take a bit of time to organize and send the required notice by mail, and to
resolve issues regarding specifications of ELVIS. Hopefully, we will be able to
send notice by mail so that you receive it late next week. We will continue to
send notices, reminders and updates by e-mail as appropriate.
I am sorry for
the inconvenience this may have caused, but we are committed to complying with our
local constitution and bylaws, AFT National’s bylaws as well as applicable
Federal law.
In solidarity,
David Trubatch
Chair, 2012 AFT
Local 1904 Election Committee
