Another look at CDSL 13-05 Chancellor Election Act

[Jerry McNally]

Hi. As can be seen in the minutes of the RA meeting July 7, a request was received from the SC that the CDSL 13-05 Chancellor Election Act be looked at again. This Act was last reviewed in May.

Below is the current text of the Act together with the SC's points from their June 9 meeting in green.

 
CDSL 13-05 Chancellor Election Act

1. Chancellors are elected for a 6-month term and can hold at most two contested terms in succession. This preserves interest in serving as Chancellor, and allows an existing incumbent to continue to sit if uncontested.

Section 1: the use of 'consecutive' allows for a 'permanent' Chancellor, should there never be someone contesting the position in consecutive elections.

2. Chancellor terms start simultaneously with the Representative Assembly terms.

3. Any citizen may become a candidate by declaring themselves by a message to the Dean of the Scientific Council, two weeks before the voting booths open. On the next day, all applicants will be listed by the Dean of the Scientific Council, and campaigning begins one week before the voting booths open. Elections shall be held over a 168 hour period beginning at noon SLT on the Saturday before the 16th of the month prior to the new Chancellor taking office. In the event of a server outage which prevents citizens from casting ballots and which lasts more than 12 hours, the Dean of the Scientific Council has the authority to adjust or extend the election schedule.

Section 3: the repetition of already existing election law is unnecessary and potentially problematic in the future if law changes, or SC needs to amend election times and procedures.

4. In the event that there is only one declared candidate for Chancellor, the declared candidate shall be acclaimed into office without a campaign period or polling.

5. In case the Chancellor leaves office or is removed from it mid-term, a special Chancellor by-election will be called for by the Scientific Council which will open new applications on the day notice was given and close applications after a week.

Section 5: there is a contradiction with existing law that governs by-elections. This inclusion is unnecessary, but review of the wording of the by-election law is recommended.

6. The voting methodology will follow the same method as for the Representative Assembly election or Single-Transfer Vote if the current method for the Representative Assembly election does not work for single-candidate elections.

Section 6 is again reiterating existing law and can be omitted.

7. Any other legislation applicable to candidate eligibility and elections in general will also apply to the Chancellor election.

8. In the event that the elected Chancellor resigns after less than half the term, a new Chancellor who fills in shall finish that term. This new Chancellor can be either the candidate with the second most votes or a by-elected citizen. After this term, this citizen is granted to become regular candidate for Chancellorship under the same conditions like any other citizen in good standing.

Section 8 once again clashes with existing by-election processes.

[Almut Brunswick]

Some initial comments before starting the detail work:

• It seems to be reasonable to rework this Act together with the by-election regulations to harmonize them in one turn.

• This would also allow to add mutual links to the legal text of the corresponding laws.

• The sheer fact that something is repeated expressively in this Act that is written somewhere else does not automatically mean that it is redundant and surplus. It may also serve to exclude doubts if and up to which extent a regulation in another law is applicable. This has to be investigated and decided case-by-case though.

• In last consequence, it could be more useful to merge all currently separate election-related acts in one universal election act. That would also simplify referencing and future maintenance.

Almut

[Tanoujin Milestone]

Just an incomplete report of the discussions on the SC that led to ask the RA to review:
Initial concern was that the law allows someone to keep the Chancellor’s office as long as they are not contested two times in a row. The SC sees a possibility to have an eternal Chancellor this way and wonders if the RA is sure they want this as a feature. (Callie’s concern).
The possible redundance is no problem (as far as I personally understood) if the content is consistent and easy to update in case of further amendments.
Not so important: there was a plan to allow by-elections being skipped not only 2 months before the regular election but from 3 months = half term on already. Rationale: reduce workload. Observation: Chancellor Election Act and By-Election act use different timeframes.
I hope this helps. Sorry for disturbing your discussion.

[Jerry McNally]

Did the SC discussions include a proposal to mitigate that first point?

[Lilith Ivory]

There has not been an official SC discussion about CDSL 13-05 Chancellor Election Act after our meeting on June 9th 2024.
Everything that has been said about this topic can be found in the transcript
viewtopic.php?t=10658
Starting at: 07:57

And a summary of all that has been said is also in the minutes:
viewtopic.php?t=10659

Those and the notecard the Dean sent to the RA should be the only source of what the SC suggested … or what SC members have been thinking.

If I remember correctly the Dean has also offered that the SC could work on a proposal IF the RA wishes us to do so.

On a personal note:
Figuring out election timelines while following all our different laws is a very complex procedure and it took me years to understand completely how to do that. – Calli can explain best how it works – as the RA should understand them too before trying to „harmonize“ our election and By-election Acts.

[Lilith Ivory]

@ Jerry:

Since the SC did not get asked to create a proposal we did not vote on how to deal with this first point.
What is important is to amend the wording so there are no loop holes - depending on how the RA wants to handle Term Limits.

Of course all SC members have private opinions as citizens about how this could be handled. You can find some of it in the transcript.

… and if I may add:
As a citizen who likes to keep things uncomplicated I would be in favor of not having term limits at all – as long as we have to struggle to find a candidate for the chancellor office. Why build up hurdles and get stuck in bureaucracy? If situation changes and we get real chancellor elections on a regular basis we can always introduce term limits again.