(Preliminary) Precinct Certification Report

PRELIMINARY PRECINCT CERTIFICATION REPORT

Background:

When the Party holds its annual precinct meetings each year, there is a considerable amount of effort that takes place behind the scenes to process paperwork and verify the precinct information that is returned from each of the precinct meetings. Assuming that the notice requirements have been met, the precinct information is reviewed against five key requirements:

• QUORUM RULE: There was a quorum of five active Democrats residing in the precinct present at the meeting.

• NO VACANCIES RULE: There are three officers (Chair, Vice Chair and Secretary/Treasurer).
• ACTIVE DEMOCRAT: The quorum and elected officers are active Democrats within the precinct.
• GENDER RULE: The Chair and Vice Chair are of different genders.
• HOUSEHOLD RULE: No officers of the precinct committee can reside in the same household.

There is also other guidelines on the composition of the precinct committee (around age, ethnicity/race, and geography) but these appear to be more guidelines than rules.

That information is compiled, reviewed, certified, and entered into VoteBuilder, where it becomes ingrained in the Party's operations.

Unfortunately for us, that information is a snapshot of the precinct as it stood at the time it was organized. The only thing that won't change is the presence of a quorum of active Democrats at the time of the meeting. Everything else can change. Namely, people move out of the precinct, people die, people resign from office, and people change their registrations. Each of these events creates a vacancy within the precinct committee, but generally, no one informs their precinct committees or WCDP of the change. In many cases, the precinct committees become defective without being aware of the event that disqualified them.

The Plan also requires that these vacancies be filled within 30 days, which has led to a variety of informal rules and procedures for remedying the situation. In particular, the Gender and Household Rules are ignored (and there is a tabled motion before the SEC to formally ignore the Gender Rule under certain circumstances). The overarching goal has been to promote continuity and consistency across our precinct operations so that precincts that are duly organized stay duly organized.

As a result, we need a tool that allows us to continuously monitor the status of our precincts so that the Board and the precincts can take proper actions to resolve any defects and maintain thriving precincts.

Description:

This report provides, for each precinct, the names and addresses of its officers (along with their gender and party), and notes on whether or not the precinct is in violation of rules 2-5 above. The report is generated from the precinct certification information provided by precincts in 2009 and 2010, plus any information submitted to or discovered by WCDP. Ultimately, all of this information is tied back to the Wake County Board of Elections voter file, as published and downloaded each week. By checking the information against the voter file, the report is able to identify any changes in addresses or registration (or even gender) that may violate a rule in the Plan of Organization and disqualify a precinct.

In other words, if there is a change in the precinct organization, we will know as soon as it is reflected in the voter file. This is not as timely as learning directly from the precinct that an officer has moved, died or resigned, but it prevents the Board from not knowing until the next annual precinct meeting.

We will also use this method to certify and monitor other positions within WCDP that require officers (or members) to be active Democrats residing within a particular precinct or district.

What Happens Next?:

As you will notice, there are a handful of precincts that are perfectly organized (no vacancies, all active Dems, and no issues with households or genders). You will also notice that there are precincts that are perfectly unorganized (no officers at all). And then there are plenty of precincts that are stuck in between (due to vacancies, gender issues or household issues). These "in between" precincts are considered to be "defective".

The defective precincts should be given the opportunity to cure their defects, either by electing new officers or by certifying that the defect was a last resort (i.e., there were no men interested in being Vice Chair, hence the gender defect). I do worry about the household rule when two members of the same household are Chair and Vice-Chair and, accordingly, are able to vote the entire weight of a precinct. Those cases should probably require a new election.

In all cases, the defective precincts will need to appear before the Credentialing Committee to be certified for the upcoming CEC election.

The full report can be downloaded below as a PDF; real-time information can be found using the Precincts Tool.

For more information, call Tammy @ (919) 828-5656.