NAMI has moved the voting process to an industry leading online voting system called Evote using a well-regarded site, ElectionsOnline (www.electionsonline.com).

NAMI has put together a short 6-minute video to show voters how the Online Voting system works. Click on the NAMI Elections Online Voting Demo to watch.

What does this mean for NAMI Affiliates and NAMI State Organizations?

  • Affiliates and State Organizations will now be casting their ballots directly. in advance of the Annual Meeting.

  • Time and money are saved – once the person casting the vote logs into the system, it takes less than 5 minutes to complete the ballot if the choices have already been made. 

  • NAMI staff will remain responsive to any and all questions or concerns from Affiliates and State Organizations about the new system.

How will the ease of use and privacy of voting be guaranteed?

  • Votes are kept completely confidential. The system will tell NAMI WHO has voted, but not HOW they voted. The actual vote remains secret once cast.

  • The user credentials are linked to the Affiliate or State Organization identification code so there is security in knowing the vote being cast is for your group.

  • Once a voter has cast the ballot, the unique user credentials are locked out so no one can use them to try to vote again.

  • The system handles the vote weighting for us so no additional “math” is required by NAMI once the election is closed.

  • The ballot is set so that it cannot be submitted if a voter accidentally votes for more or less than 5 candidates or skips the bylaws amendment(s) or board resolution(s). This will ensure that EVERY vote is counted and valid.

Why is this beneficial to NAMI?

  • The Evote system is a step forward as NAMI continues to leverage technology.

  • It takes away the use of the temperamental and outdated Scantron machine NAMI used in the past to count ballots so the results of the elections are not delayed due to potential machine malfunctions or possibly even failure.

  • This also means the results are tabulated immediately after the election is closed.

  • It is a HUGE savings in time and money for NAMI as a whole.

More information about Evote and ElectionsOnline

David Simms, founder, developer of Evote and president of the company, saw a need to create an online system to handle elections. Evote has been used since 2002 to help professional associations, unions, businesses, educational institutions, community groups and many more organizations elect their leadership and pass resolutions and amendments. He and his designers always kept simplicity of use as key to the system.

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