All,

Please indulge an election procedure post--with four weeks of balloting remaining, I think a reminder of procedures is warranted.

Ballots for the AMSAT board of directors election must be received by 5 p.m. US Eastern Time on Tuesday, September 15. If you have received your ballot and wish to vote, please mail your ballot with sufficient time to arrive by this time.

If you have not received your ballot and were a member of AMSAT on July 1, please email me at brennanprice@verizon.net to request a replacement ballot. All such requests that were made by today (Monday, August 17) have been fulfilled no later than today.

A note to non-US based members: The printed return envelope does not specify that the return address is in the United States. The design of the envelope (my effort alone) may be fairly criticized on this basis. Several non-US members have added USA to the printed return address and successfully returned the ballot. This is my recommended remedy, but if for whatever reason it's too late for that (and I know of one such case), I will gladly send a replacement (as I have in said case).

I am verifying envelopes against the voter list and keeping them unopened until the time of counting, when they will be opened face down and separated from the ballot without immediate counting to maintain secrecy. This is a key part of verifying that each ballot going out generates no more than one ballot coming back in. Presumably out of an understandable but self-defeating desire to ensure the secrecy of the ballot beyond this procedure, about ten members have sought to obscure the return address or use a different envelope, either with no return address or a different return address.

In all but one of those cases, the printed address was insufficiently obscured, or the alternate address was traceable to a member who had not yet voted. The attention required to verify the nonconforming envelope in each case substantially exceeded the attention normally necessary, and actually increased the possibility of me inadvertently discerning the contents without opening the envelope through inspection I would ordinarily forego. Nevertheless, these envelopes have been accepted for eventual accounting.

In the remaining case, postmarked last week in Grand Junction, Colorado, there is no indication on the outside the envelope to permit me to conclude that the ballot is not cumulative of one already returned. As it stands, this is the only envelope out of the several hundred returned thus far that I cannot accept.

If you are that voter mailing from or near Grand Junction, please be in touch so we can remedy. All others, please use the provided return envelope.

I welcome questions.

73, Brennan Price, N4QX Secretary Radio Amateur Satellite Corporation