NE2: Regional Voting Regulations Act 2014 (Failed)

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I'd support this.

However, I seem to recall us having either an existing law or Constitutional amendment that prohibits any ballot editing - but I'm having trouble finding it now. Can somebody clear this up for me?

Also while we're at it we might want to codify an official sample ballot/OP.

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I was thinking something along these lines:

As _______, I hereby declare this polling place open at 12:01am EST on _________.


This is the Northeast regional polling booth for the _____ election. In this polling place, Northeast citizens are electing five members to the Assembly.

Votes for offices in this region are cast using PR-STV.  Voters who wish to preference more than one candidate should allocate a first preference for a candidate by marking a [1] in the space provided by that candidate's name, and proceeding to number as many preferences as they desire by marking a [2], [3], etc for as many candidates as they so desire.

A vote will be counted so long as the voter that casts it is eligible to vote in this election and casts  a formal ballot. A vote is formal so long as it contains numbered preferences with no duplicate numbers. A ballot containing Roman Numerals is not considered informal. A ballot in which candidates have been ranked a,b,c, etc is not considered informal so long as no letter has been repeated, and so long as a single candidate has been ranked a, for as long as the letters are consecutive with no duplicate letters. A ballot is formal if the CJO can determine the intent of the voter without interviewing that voter.

Per past practice, write-in votes are only counted for a candidate if he or she publicly declares a willingness to receive write-in votes for a particular office in the [name of election] before the polls close in the Candidate Declaration Thread or writes in his or her own name on the ballot for that particular office.

Votes for "NOTA" or "None of the Above" for any office are formal regardless of the preference assigned to it. Should a voter preference "NOTA" as well as other candidates, only his vote for "NOTA" will be counted.

This booth shall remain open until _____ at 11:59:59 PM EST.

Official Ballot

Northeast Assembly
Five people will be elected to the Assembly.

[ ] A
[ ] B
[ ] C
[ ] D
[ ] E
[ ] Write-in:____________
[ ] None of the Above
[ ] Abstain

It's a bit much but we could always have a blank template in the Civic Information Thread.

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Is that part enforced these days? I think votes including NOTA as a numbered preference have not been rejected.

The Federal Elections Officer counts the preferences above the one given to NOTA as valid. (I hope I said it right). 

I mostly just copypasta'd that from a previous voting booth I opened. I'd be fine with getting rid of NOTA outright since I'm not sure it's constructive to have it as an option.

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As CJO, I enforced the NOTA provisions in every voting booth that I maintained. I wouldn't be opposed to removing the option, however.

Also, Dallas, thanks for making the whole sample ballot. I was planning on it but then other things got in the way!

I just copy and pasted it from one of my old voting booths but it might be good for each of us to give it a once-over before we make anything official.

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We should probably get a vote.

FTR I'll be voting nay since there's still a bit of work to do on this.

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Nay