if you want me to include the images in the mail, could you upload this in pdf format?

Getting worried that there might be a bit of an unfairness in the system in that parties can use (and are using) the electoral database to advertise their senate candidates, but senators not affiliated with a party do not have access to the same resources.

Perhaps the law (and the privacy settings in the database) should be changed to allow senate candidates access to the electoral database.

Quote from: GV on July 15, 2020, 05:27:58 PM
Cosâ: FREEDEMS

Për * 54RZ16 - The There's No Such Thing As A Free Senäts Seat Amendment
Për * 54RZ22 - The Amada Mertgedes Martyrdom Memorial Act
Për * 54RZ23 - The Uniform Seneschál Election Act
Për * 54RZ25 - Judiciary Amendment of 2020
Për * 54RZ28 - The Non-Hereditary Monarchy Amendment

Many thanks as always to the SoS, Dep. SoS, and the Chancery for all they do to make our nationette continue to function...

GV 15 July 2020

This vote has been entered in the database.

Disagreed that citizens who specifically dont want government newsletters should get government newsletters.

Also worried that it might result in people ignoring all Talossa related email or people changing their database email.

Quote from: Miestră Schivă, UrN on July 14, 2020, 10:57:50 PM
AND WHEREAS anecdotal evidence suggests that citizens who have opted out from the Electorate Database (for political advertising) or the Contact Database (for contact from other citizens) are also not getting the emails that have been sent out by the Government, that is, that the Chancery have assumed that they have "opted out";

This is not true. The contact database isn't functioning at the moment because you need to opt in and I think only one person has. Opting out from the electoral database doesnt result in an opt out from government communications (though its possible that some have blocked the email address used for both alltogether).

The people who opted out from the government list (more than people who opted in to the contact one) replied opt out to one of the  chronica mails

This seems like a sensible idea.

Though it doesn't stop a situation like Vuode where a law was passed that seems almost designed to prevent anyone not fully up to date with provincial law from running, resulting in two unopposed elections in a way that seems wildly undemocratic to me.

To be honest, I'm quite disappointed with the way this law has turned out. Several provinces have made quite a mess of their provincial elections at some point in the last few years.

Fwiw, I do think such a request can be made by provincial law though, even when there isn't a functional government. In the case of Cézembre, I believe the constitutions requires the Sénéchal to make such a request. I think it's fair therefore to interpret this request as automatic, so the Chancery will conduct the elections there.

--Polling Station 1: Wittenberg-

NB: This is a polling place. Only use this thread for your votes! (Opinions, questions, comments can be posted elsewhere.)

NB: Your vote cannot be changed once cast. Do not edit your posts!

The August 2020 General Elections to elect the 55th Cosa, provincial assemblies and 4 senate seats* in addition to the five referenda on amendments to the Organic Law is now active.

*The provinces of Vuode and Maritiimi-Maxhestic are holding their own Senate elections. To vote and for more information please check the provincial forum on wittenberg.

You can find the election rules here.

Ballots will be sent today. If you do not receive a ballot today, please send me a pm.

If you believe there is something wrong with the ballot, please contact me ASAP.


HOW TO VOTE

As per the Organic Law, all votes are final, and cannot be retracted, modified or altered in any way: if multiple votes are sent, only the first one is counted. The only exception is that if you vote on the Cosa part, but forgot to vote on the Senate part, you may add your Senate vote before the election deadline using voting method 1, 2, or 4* (see below). The database admin will then manually insert your Senate vote into the database.

*In this case, make a new separate post, do not alter your original post.

There are five ways to vote:

1 ) You can reply to their Ballot email with your vote, provided the PSC code is in the email. Those votes will be entered manually into the Database system.

2 ) You can write a different email (to talossachancery@gmail.com), provided the PSC code is in it. Those votes will be entered manually into the Database system.

3 ) You can vote using the online form: www.talossa.ca/files/vote.php using only your citizen number (available online and in the email) and the PSC code from the email. Those votes will be entered automatically into the Database system.

4 ) Voters will be able to vote on Wittenberg publicly A single vote thread will be created for casting votes on Wittenberg. If you have received your vote code (PSC), you are requested to cast your vote in that thread WITH your PSC. A vote without PSC will be validated provided the account clearly belongs to a single eligible voter.

5 ) You can print the ballot located here at www.talossa.ca/files/votebymail.php and mail it to the address located at the bottom of the ballot. Keep in mind that votes need to arrive before the election deadline to be valid and voting by mail might take long, especially from a location outside western Europe. (NOTICE: the vote by mail ballot is not fully updated yet.  When voting by mail please keep in mind the instructions on the email ballot or here.)


KEEP IN MIND WHEN VOTING

Especially when voting using a different method than the database, keep in mind the following:

* Specify which part you are voting for. Unspecified party votes will only count towards the Cosa election.

* Write-in parties for the Cosa elections cannot receive votes. A write-in vote has the same effect as Present/Invalid.

* For the Senate part, rank as many eligible candidates as you want in order of preference. Do not include one candidate multiple times. Please include a candidate's full name or citizen number. Ambiguous votes may be rejected. Write-In votes for eligible citizens are allowed.

* Party votes do not count in any way for Senate elections.

* As per the Organic Law, all votes are final, and cannot be retracted, modified or altered in any way: if multiple votes are sent, only the first one is counted. The only exception is that if you vote on the Cosa part, but forgot to vote on the Senate part, you may add your Senate vote before the election deadline using voting method 1, 2, or 4* (see above). The database admin will then manually insert your Senate vote into the database.

* *In this case, make a new separate post, do not alter your original post.

WHAT TO VOTE ON

If you vote on witt, please include the following parts:
(On witt your vote will always be public.)


Part 3: Cosa Election
For the Cosa, please vote for the party you want to vote for.

Three parties have registered:
FREEDEMS - Free Democrats of Talossa
NPW - New Peculiar Way
LCC - League of Centre Conservatives

More information about these parties (50 word statements, leaders, link to party platform, etc) can be found on your ballot, on the online voting form and on the election rules page.

If you do not wish to vote for a party you can also indicate "PRESENT" for the Party Vote. This counts as vote in regards to keeping your citizenship.
(You risk losing your citizenship if you did not vote or take part in a census during the last two years.)


Part 5: Referendum
There are five referenda this year:

* 54RZ16 - The There's No Such Thing As A Free Senäts Seat Amendment
* 54RZ22 - The Amada Mertgedes Martyrdom Memorial Act
* 54RZ23 - The Uniform Seneschál Election Act
* 54RZ25 - Judiciary Amendment of 2020
* 54RZ28 - The Non-Hereditary Monarchy Amendment
You may vote Për (in favour), Contrâ (against), or Abstain on these amendments.
The full texts can be found by clicking the links.


Part 6: Senate Election
Please include your vote for Senator if you are a citizen of any of the following provinces:

- Benito
- Cézembre

In addition, the provinces of Vuode and Maritiimi-Maxhestic are holding their own Senate elections. To vote and for more information please check the provincial forum on wittenberg.

To vote for Senate, list 1 or more (the database ballot accepts up to 5) eligible citizens of your province in order of preference!

If you leave this empty your vote will count as abstain and your vote for the other parts will still be valid.
Important: votes for a party do NOT count here. You will need to vote for an individual candidate.

The following candidates have registered for senate seats:
Benito: #330 - Eiric Börnatfiglheu
Cézembre: #152 - Sir X. Pol Briga
Cézembre: #284 - Ian Tamoran

Write-in votes for Senate are also allowed


Part 7: Provincial Election
Here you can vote for whichever party you wish to represent you in your provincial assembly. The provincial assembly elections of the following provinces are conducted by the chancery:

- Atatürk

- Benito
(For the Benito Legislative Assembly, please vote for a party, or PRESENT if you wish to cast a null ballot.)

- Cézembre

- Florencia
(Vote for a party or vote "present")

If you leave this empty your vote will count as abstain and your vote for the other parts will still be valid.

WHEN TO VOTE

Any time between 15 July 07:00 TST and 1 August 19:30 TST (UTC-5) (This corresponds to 19:30 in Milwaukee (WI), USA and 02:30 on the 2nd of December in St. Malo, France)





PS for those interested: here you can find who have and have not voted yet.
Current turnout: 0

Also,  here(TBD) is a list of citizen numbers of citizens who are at risk of losing their citizenship at the end of the election.

Lastly, please just use this thread for voting. For questions, concerns, etc you can use this thread. Additionally, this thread should be treated as a polling station. This is not the place for campaigning or political arguments.

Many thanks to @mpf whose amazing work on the database makes this election possible.

EMAIL DATABASE FOR ALL CITIZENS
53RZ23 established a database of name, province and email address of all citizens who opt-in, available to every citizen. This has not been automated yet. If you wish to be included in this database please contact the Secretary of State on Witt or send an email to talossachancery@gmail.com stating that you wish to be included in the database for all citizens.

Thread updated.

Registrations for parties is now closed. (candidate lists / party platforms can still be updated today)

Senate candidates can also still register to get on the ballot today.

I think(?) strictly speaking there isn't a deadline for referendum statements, but if you want to get your statement on the ballot when it's first sent out, best to submit them today as well.

Quote from: Miestră Schivă, UrN on July 13, 2020, 09:58:45 PM

BTW, Mr SoS, did the Free Democrats candidate for Cézembre get in touch?

Not that I'm aware of.

Quote from: xpb on July 12, 2020, 10:34:57 PMI was honored to serve Cézembre for that one session and shall place my name up for regular election for consideration of the citizenry.

Assuming this counts as registration. If you want to be extra sure, it might be wise to confirm it by posting in the official rules and registrations thead, sending me a pm or sending an email to talossachancery@gmail.com.

IX.3 just allows provinces to delegate their elections to the chancery. It says nothing about the Chancery being required to conduct every election a province requests in accordance with the specific wishes of that province.

It's long been tradition in Talossa for the Chancery to provide the raw vote totals and provinces to do whatever calculations they want with those. This appears to me quite sensible as the Chancery is better suited to conduct the election (already sending out a ballot to which a provincial election can, because of mpfs great work on the database, be added with the press of a button), but provinces are perfectly capable of following their own procedures themselves and this frees the SoS from having to be an expert of the election procedures of eight different provinces and doing eight different calculations after each election.

What the Chancery offers is a line on the ballot, option to include additional instructions to whats on the ballot by default* and the raw vote totals at the end.

* I think(?) it reads "[province] is running it's provincial election at this time. You can enter your vote(s) below and it will be compiled by the Chancery"

Thread updated

Quote from: xpb on July 12, 2020, 06:53:29 PM
So in the early part of this thread the dates are shifting June to July (ballots out by 7/25 and July to August (ballots due 8/1) correct?

Oops! Yes, that is correct (ballots out 7/15). Will fix it asap.

Thread should be fully up to date now.

Quote from: Miestră Schivă, UrN on July 11, 2020, 12:43:44 AM
So what are the rules re: political parties and/or Senäts candidates using the Chancery mailing lists for publicising themselves?

Same as last year: party leaders get access to the list of people who indicated they are willing to be contacted by parties. I'm also willing to send two mails per party using the contact-via-the-chancery-only-list.

After the registration deadline ends I will probably send all party leaders an email about this again.