Article by Jack Burrows, Area 2 Director

The bylaws which govern SCCA have remained largely unchanged for some years. Our bylaws can only be revised by a vote of our members and require ballots to be sent and returned through the mail. Given the time and money involved in mailing ballots with postage paid return envelopes, this is a costly, cumbersome, and protracted process.

The club's Board of Directors therefore proposes to drag SCCA into the current millennium by changing our bylaws to provide for electronic voting. A detailed explanation of the proposal with its specific changes to our bylaws and the resulting voting process will be laid out in an article in upcoming issues of Sports Car.

Essentially, the Board's proposal is to allow SCCA to use electronic ballots (e.g., email) for things which our bylaws require to be voted on by our members. It also provides for people to opt out of electronic balloting if they prefer to receive and return hard copy ballots by mail. This change can't happen unless and until its voted on and approved by our members. Eligible members will therefore be receiving a ballot in the mail in the coming weeks asking for approval of electronic notification for items requiring a vote of the membership. The Board and I ask for your approval.

This would not a radical change. Many - if not most - of SCCA's regions already use electronic voting for things like elections for region officers. So the proposal would merely serve to bring SCCA nationally into the same practice as that which already widely used on the regional level. I encourage everyone to read the Sports Car article and vote in favor of the option for us to use electronic voting.