Condo Media - December 2016 - 41

Unless the condominium documents say otherwise, it's likely that a
candidate receiving the most votes did not win unless he or she also
receives a majority of the votes cast.
bylaws are silent on particular issues
or practices. The most prominent of
these rules are Robert's Rules of Order.
Robert's Rules are officially adopted
in many condominium bylaws. If the
bylaws adopt these rules but don't
otherwise address how election winners
are determined, then Robert's, which
explicitly cover the subject, will govern.
According to Robert's, getting the
most votes is not enough. Candidates
must receive a majority of votes cast in
order to win. If no candidate receives a
majority, subsequent rounds of voting
must be held until someone does so.
The candidate receiving the fewest
votes is not required to drop out.
Although this author has not heard of
such cases, the possibility always exists
of multiple rounds of balloting until a
winner is determined.
Robert's Rules are based on the
accumulated wisdom of thousands of
comments submitted to its authors
over 150 years, refined, and revised
through 11 editions. They purport to
reflect the best practices based on those
comments and conclude that: "a rule
that a plurality shall elect is unlikely
to be in the best interest of the average
organization."
This is why Robert's requires a candidate to receive a majority of the votes
cast to be elected.
MAIL-IN BALLOTING AND
PREFERENTIAL VOTING
What if state law and the association's
bylaws allow mail-in balloting? In
such cases, time and cost factors make
run-off elections impractical. Where
elections are conducted with mail-in
ballots, Robert's still insists that candidates be elected by a majority, and to
do so, suggests that: "a better method...
is for the bylaws to prescribe some form
of preferential voting."

In preferential voting, members rank
their choices on the election ballot: 1, 2,
3. Where no candidate receives a majority, a new election is not necessary. The
candidate receiving the fewest votes
is dropped, and that candidate's votes
are re-allocated to other candidates
based on the voter's second choice. The
process goes on until someone receives
a majority.
Some cities conduct municipal
elections using preferential voting,
including Minneapolis, San Francisco,
and Portland, Maine. By the time
you read this, Maine voters will have
decided Referendum Question 5, on
the ballot for November, which would

require all state and local elections
to be conducted using preferential
voting. Maine's terminology is
"Ranked Choice Voting," which is the
same idea. Its proponents argue that
Ranked Choice Voting will ensure
that candidates with the broadest
support will win, that it discourages
negative campaigning and gives voters
more choices.

n JOSEPH G. CARLETON, JR., ESQ.,
CCAL IS AN ATTORNEY WITH LAW
OFFICES IN WELLS, MAINE.

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