2008 Election Results

    We thank everyone who took the time to vote with our new e-voting system, and we thank Vote-Now for providing such an easy-to-use system.

    There were 338 ballots submitted. The results (a foregone conclusion, given that none of the races was contested):

    For Chair-Elect:    Bruce Raby        324 votes
    For Secretary:      Karl Marhenke     326 votes
    For Treasurer:      Herb Silber       323   "

    Bruce will be Chair-Elect in 2009, Chair in 2010 and Past Chair in 2011.
    Karl Marhenke and Herb Silber will continue to serve in 2009 as Secretary and Treasurer, respectively.

    The other officers for 2009 will be:
         Chair:         Natalie  McClure, our current Chair-Elect
         Past Chair:  Mark Kent, our current Chair

    There were single write-in votes for each of three people for Chair Elect, for each of two real people and one ficticious name for Treasurer, and for each of two living people and one deceased one for Secretary.

    For Councilor:    Abby Kennedy        308 votes
                      Howard Peters       303   "
                                                            Ean Warren          304   "

Three were to be elected. Abby, Howard and Ean were running for re-election and will serve terms running from 2009 through 2011.
    George Lechner and Herb Silber will continue as Councilors in their 3-year terms, which run from 2008 through 2010.
    Linda Brunauer, Sally Peters and Peter Rusch will continue as Councilors; their 3-year terms run from 2007 through 2009.
    There were single write-in votes for each of two people for Councilor.

    For Alternate Councilor:  David Parker  304 votes
                              Bruce Raby    295   "
                              Ihab Darwish  294   "
                              Lois Durham   321   "

    David, Bruce and Ihab were re-elected for 3-year terms which will run from 2009-2011. Lois was appointed earlier to replace an Alternate Councilor who resigned; she has now been elected to serve out the balance of the term; she will serve through 2009 only.
    Mark Kent will continue in his term as Alternate Councilor, which runs from 2008-2010
    Stephanie Gehling and Natalie McClure will continue as Alternate Councilors in their 3-year terms, which run from 2007 through 2009.
    Ferenc Makra has resigned as Alternate Councilor; he will be replaced for the balance of 2008 and all of 2009 by appointment by the Executive Committee and his position will be filled by election (or re-election) in next fall's election.
    There were single write-in votes for each of three people for the 3-year term for Alternate Councilor, and also single write-ins for each of three people for the 1-year term.

* * * * *

    Once again, we had no contested races. The turnout was far better than last year, probably  because of the e-voting system, provided by Vote-Now and being used for the first time this year.
     Our scarcity of candidates is not for lack of effort: our Nominations and Elections chair, Floyd Hobbs, works year round to identify potential officers, Councilors and Alternate Councilors and to persuade them to run.
    We hasten to point out that there is a petition method of nominating candidates; all it takes is the signatures of 15 members of the Santa Clara Valley Section, and you're on the ballot. All 15 members can even work for the same employer! All you would have to do is carry a clip board around the lab, or from office to office. A few years ago, Bonnie Charpentier's name was placed on the ballot for Chair Elect by petition and she won the election over the Nomination Committee candidate.
    Thus putting a candidate's name on the ballot via the petition process produces a FAR greater chance of getting your candidate elected than the use of write-in votes does. Note the single votes listed above for write-in candidates. Every one of them lost by a margin of about 300-1. Some of the write-ins were for names of people who are not even members of our Section (and are thus ineligible to serve), and one was for Linus Pauling, who, sad to say, is deceased.
   So once again we make our pitch for involvement. We are a volunteer organization; we have no paid staff. We urge you to join with us in the work of the Santa Clara Valley Section. It does not have to be time consuming, it is very worthwhile, and it will give you a  feeling of accomplishment, whether it be in aiding fellow chemists in some way, or bringing your enthusiasm for science to young people. You can start by attending the next dinner meeting or Executive Committee meeting and talking to the people there. You don't even have to run for election to an office; you can help out on one of our committees just by saying you'd like to be a member.

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