ITI Technical Committee Voting Procedures

Voting on committee activities

The following text describes the initial voting procedures which will be used by the ITI Technical committee as it transitions to support of the Governance procedures adopted by IHE International. These voting procedures will be revised frequently, as we gather new information from members, Domain Coordination Committee and the IHE International Board. The procedures will become more final on the date that the IHE International Board declares that we must implement the governance procedures. After that implementation date, changes to the procedures will be voted on by the committee membership. The implementation date is currently January 1, 2008 but prerequisite activities have missed their dates so it is fairly certain that the implementation date will also be moved.

We will have slightly different procedures prior to the implementation date and after the implementation date. The reason for this is that prior to the implementation date we do not have a clear list of members. Part of the roll out up to implementation is application by organizations to become members. Until that application process has begun we cannot have a good or clear list of membership. As a committee participant you are encouraged to respond quickly to the application for membership call when it is released. That is one of the two things you must do to maintain your right to vote within the ITI Technical Committee. The other thing is to ensure that you vote or abstain at every meeting and email ballot. Please review Roster Status for details regarding maintaining your voting privileges. These rules will be in effect after the implementation date. Prior to that date we will count anyone voting as member and will not require a quorum.

The following are procedures we intend to follow:

• Any vote may be submitted by email to our secretary (currently LaVerne Palmer) or voted in person at meetings. For email ballots all votes will be submitted by email and must be submitted by the due date. For meetings the vote must be submitted prior to the time of the vote during the meeting.
• Each member may carry one proxy from another member. The proxy must be declared prior to the beginning of the meeting. It is declared by the bestower of the proxy via email to the secretary and by copy to the co-chairs. Proxies cannot be used for email ballots. The term "member" here refers to a member organization. The holder of the proxy will be a Voting or Alternate member, but no one member organization can vote more than one proxy.
• Meetings will be declared as discussion or decision meetings.
  • At discussion meetings there will be no voting or decisions made, it will allow only for technical discussion of the issues on a particular topic. Participating in a discussion meeting will not count towards maintaining voting rights. Minutes from discussion meetings will not be voted on for approval.
  • At decision meetings there may be votes or conclusions drawn. Minutes will be approved after the meeting by email ballot. Participating in the meeting counts towards maintaining voting rights. Response to the minutes approval email ballot counts separately towards maintaining voting rights. See Roster Status for details regarding the rules for maintaining voting rights. Please note that prior to the implementation date we will allow anyone present to vote (independent of prior participation). After the implementation date we will only allow voting from members that participated in at least one of the two previous votes. Other members can vote at their second participating in a decision meeting or email ballot.
• An email ballot is equivalent to a decision meeting in terms of consideration for maintenance of voting privileges. At present we have email ballots for: approval of minutes, CP ballots, co-chair election.
• After the implementation date we will follow the governance rules which require a quorum of 50% of the voting members for a vote. Prior to that date will will not require a quorum.
• After the implementation date only members will be allowed to participate in ITI Technical Committee meetings. Members are people who work for/are employed by a member organization. Others who wish to participate may do so on a very limited basis (i.e. for discussion of a particular topic) when agreed to by the co-chairs.

Open Issues

• How to handle international membership that cannot attend meetings because of time zone problems? Allowing email balloting is troublesome since people who have not participated in the meeting will not be making an informed decision.
• How to handle email ballots that do not make sense. For instance, if we decided to vote for three items, and someone sends a vote for seven items. Generally happens when people cannot be available for the voting section of a meeting so guess on what the voting will be like.
• How to handle one person who represents multiple organizations.

Voting for board representative

Under the governance rules each IHE development domain selects one representative and one alternate to the IHE International Board. Prior to the adoption of the governance rules all co-chairs were automatically a part of the IHE governing body, called the Strategic Development Committee. The IHE International Board replaces the Strategic Development Committee and representatives are elected from within the IHE membership. The ITI domain will select its representative and alternate using the following process:

1. Sponsor canvasses co-chairs to see who is interested in serving on the Board. Co-chairs are encouraged to state if they are running for another position on the board for which they qualify.
2. Sponsor prepares a slate of remaining candidates.
3. Sponsor calls an email ballot of the ITI Planning and Technical committees. each member gets one vote even if they are members of both committees.
4. The sponsor tallies the vote and announces results. Top vote getter is board member, second vote getter is alternate.