Ballot stuffing

Marking the ballots
Marking the units numbers on ballots may intimidate the voters as they feel that the board and manager will retaliate against the owners who vote against the board's wishes.

Ballot boxes
I don't know why providing a proper ballot box seems impossible for some property managers and lawyers. I was at two condo owner meetings lately where ballot and proxy integrity seemed to be an unknown concept.


If the Iranians got this part of voting right, why haven't our condos?

At a requisition meeting, the property manager used a large open black plastic bin. There was no lid. He laid the black bin on the floor by his feet, half out of sight, and just dropped the proxies into it, one by one as they were registered. Later, the ballots were dropped into the same large open box.

At the requisition table, loose ballots were laying about. I protested to the Chair and the ballot handling improved but just slightly.

Empty ballot box?
A few years ago, when I was first fighting the board at my previous condo, I met a condo activist who told me of the AGM at his condo where they managed to elect a new majority to the board and remove the property management company.

The property manager ran the registration desk and the condo corporation lawyer, was the Chair.

Prior to the election, an owner asked the Chair to open the ballot box so the owners could see that it was empty. The Chair became indigent and stated that the manager had an excellent reputation in the industry and making such a statement was an insult and completely uncalled for.

A big argument broke out and the "empty" ballot box fell onto the floor. About twenty filled-in ballots fell on the floor.

Some reputation!

Sure it's empty
At an AGM in January 2014, the property manager used a large paper box with a slot cut in the top for the ballot box. A little better than the last example but not much.

When the Chair asked the owners to place their ballots in the box, a couple of owners demanded to know if the box was empty.

The Chair, a condo lawyer, said sure. He opened the box and said the only thing in here are the proxies and a few ballots for the people who already voted and left the room. He picked out a pile of proxies and ballots and then waved the paper box around and said: "See, the box is empty" before putting the proxies and ballots back in. Then the owners added their ballots.

I was dumbfounded. What was next? A cream pie fight? However, the owners seemed to be satisfied.

Clear plastic containers are both cheap and readily available almost everywhere from Canadian Tire, department stores, book stores, grocery stores to Grand & Toy. You can get them at Home Depot for only $5.00.

Why don't the managers and the lawyers buy two; one for the proxies and one for ballots. They can fit easily in the trunk of their cars.

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