Judge Foundry is pleased to announce that the election process for Board of Directors and Regional Advocate positions is starting now! Judge Foundry is led by a five-member Board of Directors. Each of the eleven regions is represented by a Regional Advocate. Our bylaws require an election for a new Board of Directors be held in conjunction with the Annual Meeting every September; we hold elections for the Regional Advocates at the same time.
This year, we have one big change for how the elections will work: in previous years, the election window was contained within the hours of the Annual Meeting. Last winter, we amended the bylaws to allow for a longer voting period. That means that for the 2026 elections, voting will begin two weeks before the day of the Annual Meeting, and will close a half hour after the scheduled start time of the Annual Meeting.
An important clarification: this article lays out the schedule and procedures for these elections, which will conclude during the Annual Meeting. Voting members do not need to attend the Annual Meeting, either in-person or remotely, in order to vote in these elections. In order to attend the Annual Meeting (in-person or remotely), members must apply to the Annual Meeting event on JudgeApps. (This article will be updated with a link to that JudgeApps event when it’s made available.)
A forthcoming set of Standing Rules will formalize the process for these elections leading up to our Annual Meeting. For our Board of Directors election we use Proportional Representation with Ranked Choice Voting, specifically the Meek STV rules. For the Regional Advocate elections we use Instant Runoff Voting.
Level 3, 4, and 5 members of Judge Foundry may nominate themselves for the Board of Directors. Level 2 and higher members may nominate themself for Regional Advocate of the region they live in. All voting members (Level 1 and higher) may cast a ballot. This article lays out the schedule and procedures for these elections.
Schedule
Note: Deadlines are at 11:59 PM, UTC-12, also known as “Anywhere on Earth”, unless a time and timezone is specified. “Anywhere on Earth” means that the window closes only when that date has passed in every timezone on Earth.
- A preliminary list of eligible voters has been generated and made available to Judge Foundry members. See below to check your eligibility and region assignment.
- Nominations are open today. The deadline to nominate yourself is August 20th.
- Members can submit questions to be asked of all candidates. The Q&A period starts when nominations close and ends September 4th.
- Questions will be forwarded to candidates during the Q&A period. The last chance for candidates to submit or update answers is September 11th.
- Candidates may also submit a closing statement by September 11th.
- The final list of eligible voters will be generated on the Record Date for the Annual Elections: September 12th.
- Voting begins that same day: September 12th. The voting window will remain open for two weeks, and will close a half hour after the start time of the Annual Meeting on September 26th.
- Votes will be counted and winners announced as soon as possible after voting closes.
Candidates
Eligible Candidates
Judge Foundry members can run for Board of Directors if:
- They are Level 3 or higher Judges.
- They are 18 years of age or older.
Judge Foundry members can run for Regional Advocate if:
- They are Level 2 or higher Judges.
- They are not employed by a major tournament organizer nor serve as a staffing manager for a major tournament organizer.
- They are not a Director. (Members may nominate themselves for both Board of Directors and Regional Advocate, but may not serve in both roles concurrently.)
Nominations
Members may nominate themselves today. There are two different forms: one for Board of Directors nominations and one for Regional Advocate nominations. Only self-nominations are accepted—if you think someone else should run, please encourage them to nominate themselves. The last day to nominate yourself is August 20th.
The Elections Committee has curated a few default questions which we believe will help voters evaluate each candidate. Nominees may (but are not required to) include a nomination statement of up to 4000 characters, and answers to any or all of the default questions of up to 1500 characters each. Nominees will receive edit access to a personalized Google Document where they may submit their responses to the Elections Committee for publication, allowing them to update their statements and answers any time before the September 11th deadline.
When nominations are received, the Elections Committee will verify eligibility and notify the nominee of the decision.
The Judge Foundry Elections Site has a page with a list of offices, and a list of nominees for each office, which will be updated as nominations are accepted. Only candidate names will be published during the nomination window.
Pages for each candidate will be created on the Judge Foundry Elections Site at the conclusion of the nominations window. Nomination statements and answers to questions will be published on these pages.
Q&A
Eligible voters may ask questions of all of the candidates. Each voter may submit up to two questions, which should be concise and neutrally worded. This is the form for submitting questions. Users submitting this form must identify themselves to the Elections Committee to verify eligibility, but their name will not be shared with the candidate or published.
The Elections Committee will review questions. They will combine, reword, or exclude questions as needed to achieve the following goals: questions should be clear, concise, neutrally phrased, and directly related to the office sought; they should not serve as an attack on any person. Mindful of the candidates’ and voters’ time, we will select questions related to the most popular topics.
Candidates are not required to answer any or all questions, but questions will be published regardless of whether an answer is received. Candidates may submit an answer of up to 1500 characters for each question.
Closing Statements
After the Q&A period is over, candidates may submit a closing statement of up to 4000 characters to sum up the debate and make their final appeal to voters.
Candidate Conduct
If a candidate’s nomination statement or answer to any question exceeds the character limits, or is in the opinion of the Elections Committee unfit for publication due to incivility or personal attacks, it may be returned to the candidate with an explanation.
Candidates are free to discuss their candidacy in other spaces, subject to the rules and norms of those spaces. Conduct of candidates in spaces other than the Judge Foundry Elections Site will not be regulated by the Elections Committee.
Voters
Eligible Voters
The Elections Committee, with assistance of the Board of Directors, has prepared a preliminary list of eligible voters. This list has been posted in the private Judge Foundry forums on JudgeApps, click here to access it. Please check that your information is correct. This list will be updated until the record date for this election with any changes in membership. For these elections, the record date is the date that voting opens: September 12th.
If you believe that you have been incorrectly included in or excluded from the list, please email the Elections Committee at elections@judgefoundry.org.
Please verify that that email address on your JudgeApps account is correct, as that is where your ballot will be sent. Likewise, in order to vote in your region’s Regional Advocate election, your JudgeApps profile location must be set to the proper region.
Q&A
Once the full list of nominees has been announced, you can ask questions of the nominees. See the Q&A section above for more details on this process.
Voting
When the elections are opened, our online election provider will email you a link to your ballot. Please see this article for a walkthrough on the type of ballot that will be used for this election.
Ballots will be sent to your verified email address on file in JudgeApps.
Don’t forward or share your email. If you share the link, or forward the ballot email, then someone else could use your ballot to vote on your behalf.
If you notice any issue with your ballot, do not submit your vote, and contact the Elections Committee at elections@judgefoundry.org.
If you do not receive a ballot, contact the Elections Committee at elections@judgefoundry.org.
Please be careful while voting your ballot. Once your ballot is submitted to our election provider, no one can view or change your selections. Our election provider ensures that no one can see who you voted for.
Technical Details
Voting System
Board of Directors elections use Single Transferable Vote (STV) voting using the Meek ruleset. STV and Proportional Ranked Choice Voting (Proportional RCV or P-RCV) are two different ways of describing the same type of voting system – the former emphasizes that each voter has one vote, which is transferable between candidates, and the latter emphasizes that the elected board will proportionally resemble the electorate.
Good explanations of this voting system are available from Fairvote and Opavote. Voters will be presented a list of candidates in a random order. They can assign ranks to each candidate, where their preferred candidate is rank 1, their second preference is rank 2, and so on. Voters do not need to rank all of the candidates.
Counting consists of a number of automatic “rounds”. Candidates with enough votes are elected, and surplus votes pass down to the voters’ next choices. If no candidate can be elected, the candidate with the fewest votes is eliminated, and their votes are redistributed to the voters’ next choices. It is never necessary for voters to cast a new “runoff” ballot—their original ballot fully reflects their preferences and is used in every round of counting. This process tends to lead to a board which proportionally represents the electorate.
Because Regional Advocate elections are voting for a single candidate each, they use Instant Runoff Voting. This has many similarities to the Single Transferable Vote system: each voter ranks the candidates in order of preference, then votes are counted in rounds, eliminating the candidate with the fewest first-choice votes, and reassigning votes from the eliminated candidate. This likewise precludes the need to perform runoff elections.
Vote Counting
When we close the election, the results will automatically be counted and displayed by the election provider. Information provided by them is for auditing purposes, and is not official until the Elections Committee reviews, audits, and certifies the results.
Publishing Results
After the voting is complete, the Elections Committee will publish the list of winners, the list of ballots (presented in a random order without voter identification), and the list of eligible voters showing which voters actually submitted a vote.
Exceptions
The Elections Committee may modify timelines or other procedures above if needed to respond to unexpected circumstances.
