The 2020 OpenStreetMap US board elections have completed! As an election observer, I was tasked with making sure the elections were impartial and not unduly influenced, and that the vote counting was done properly.
We had a total of 7 nominees running for 5 open positions. Of our 259 members, 96 voted. This was a slight decrease in turnout from the 104 people who voted in 2019.
I’m happy to announce that the new OpenStreetMap US board is (in alphabetical order):
- Martijn van Exel
- Jubal Harpster
- Minh Nguyễn
- Daniela Waltersdorfer
- Alyssa Wright
Analysis
We use the Single Transferable Vote (STV) method of elections, where each voter gets to rank all the candidates in order of preference. Candidates who get the necessary number of votes are automatically elected (the threshold is 1/6th of the number of votes, plus one: in this case with 96 total votes the threshold to be elected is 17 votes). If a candidate has excess votes, those votes are fractionally transferred to the second choices on those ballots. If there are no candidates who are still in the running that have enough votes, then we eliminate the candidate with the fewest votes and transfer their votes to the second choices on their ballots. The counting proceeds in rounds until all five seats are filled. I’ve written some previous blog posts explaining the STV system here and here.
Unlike last year’s election, which included some exciting twists and turns during the multiple rounds of counting, this year’s results were very straightforward. The five candidates who had the most votes in the first round were the same five who were eventually elected after all the rounds of counting.
You can view the full results of each round of counting here, and you can view them as a text file here.
Bylaws Amendment Results
Also on the ballot were two proposals to change the bylaws to allow two-year board terms. These two proposals had well over the ⅔ majority support that was required, but they did not achieve the 50% turnout of the OSM US membership in order to pass. Only 37% of our members voted in this election, making it impossible to change the bylaws in this election.
Thank You
Congratulations to the new board, and thanks to those volunteers who served on the board in the previous year. Here’s to another excellent year of OpenStreetMap US, and good luck to the new board members.
Questions? Join the #elections channel on OSM US Slack, tweet us, or email us anytime.
