Elections Administration Committee: Outreach Co-Chair

Hey new EAC Chair!

Congratulations on getting this amazing job! I am so excited for you and hope that you have as valuable of an experience as I did in this role! You are going to be meeting so many new individuals this year whether they be potential candidates, committee members, volunteers, advisers, and more! I encourage you to get to know each individual you come across as best you can to establish positive connections and working relationships throughout the year.

This is an incredibly fun, challenging, yet rewarding job, and I have no doubt in my mind you will do awesome!

-Eric Liao

NetID: email: asuwvote@uw.edu, password: AsuwROX2017!

HUB reservations (http://hubres.uw.edu/hubres/Login.aspx): Username: asuwvote@uw.edu, Password: asuwvote2019

RSO office print code and equipment rental password: asuwvote-eac

SAO printer code: 1323

Budget number: 16-9414

Office desktop: asuwRulz1234! (You might need to contact the System Admin for next year, as my desktop did not work. I just used my laptop the whole year instead!)

Vice Chair Things:

• Instagram login is asuwelections and password is asuweac
• Twitter is @asuwvote and password is asuwelections2014
• Website url: https://vote.asuw.org/wp-admin/index.php

Recommended weekly events:

• Meeting with Board Liaison (Cooper Robertson)
• Meeting with SAO Adviser Christina Coop
• Meeting with Vice-Chair
• Committee meeting
• Intern meetings

Other recommendations:

• Make agendas/meeting minutes for weekly meetings to easily keep track of topics covered and questions you want to ask.
• I recommend having the advisor and intern meetings early on in the week if you can because it helps to set the agenda and priorities for the week.

Fall Quarter:

• Hire interns
• Hire committee members
• Create an advertising plan with the Vice-Chair to stick to throughout the year
  • It is helpful to create an election theme early on in the year to best execute your advertising plan.
• Evaluate the EPP by making necessary changes, then finalize it.
• Do large-scale organizational things such as reservations for big events (Kick-off fair, Board Reveal)
• Begin outreach as soon as possible – it’s never too early to create a presence for the EAC on campus

Winter Quarter:

• Advertise consistently and strongly for elections, both for candidates and voters
• Hold information sessions
• Host weekly EAC meetings (generally led by vice-chair)
• Get into the details of large-scale events (i.e. kickoff fair, ASUW forums, etc.)
• Create and finalize the 2019 Candidate’s Packet
• Finalize other election-related resources and documents
• Contact forum hosts and finalize forum dates.

Spring quarter:

1. Host final information sessions
2. Maintain contact with forum hosts
3. Host ASUW Elections Ethics Seminar
4. Finalize planning for day-of events and large-scale events leading up to elections
5. Meet twice a week with SAO
6. Elections!

• Director of Internal Policy (Cooper Robertson): asuwbdop@uw.edu
• SAO Advisor:
  • Christina Coop – cmcoop@uw.edu
• Forum hosts:
  • SAB Forum
    • Office of Minority Affairs & Diversity Student Advisory Board (SAB): omadsab@uw.edu
  • Living Communities Forum
    • Residential Communities Student Association (RCSA): extaff@uw.edu
    • Interfraternity Council (IFC): ifcuniv@uw.edu
    • Panhellenic Association: phengage@uw.edu
  • Senate Forum
    • ASUW Membership Coordinator/Speakers
• Me (Eric Liao) – (360) 556-5218 or eric_liao13@yahoo.com (Facebook message also works!)
• Check the email for other companies that we used to purchase various things!

• I kept a spreadsheet of the EAC budget in the Google Drive. I would recommend taking a look at it and using a similar concept to track the finances.
• In February, you will have to request a budget for the 2020-2021 school year. At this point, you may have spent very little money. This can be challenging but I encourage you to ask for way more money than you think you may need because your budget will be tight!
• The budget for EAC is very hard to track because we spend a lot of money right around the time of elections and almost none prior to winter quarter. To combat this, I would purchase anything that you know you will need as far in advance as is reasonable so that you have a better idea of where you are at financially.
• In addition, I would highly encourage you to ask for more hours for the EAC Chair and Vice-Chair in the Personnel request that occurs in January/February. Up until this point, your 15 hours may seem appropriate. However, this time greatly increases going into winter quarter, especially now that elections have moved up to week 4.

• Committee meetings were generally led by the Vice-Chair
• A typical structure began with full committee check ins and announcements. Then the members would break up into sub-committees led by each of three interns.
• I would consider working with the adviser to find ways to make the committee more effective. This year, the committee ran as a working group essentially which was helpful for taking some work off of Divya and I. However, I think if you are able to make the committee more involved in the elections process (i.e. helping edit the EPP, helping to make broader decisions), you will get higher retention and make the committee feel more invested.

• Last year, the EPP underwent intense review from myself, Divya, Casey, the advisers, and the Judicial Committee. However, nothing points out the flaws in your document like trying to enforce it! The EPP is a living document and is amended every year for this very reason – to allow for improvement each year.
• Here are some things that were challenging within the EPP this year that you may consider addressing next year. However, this is your year and please go in the direction that you and other stakeholders see fit!
  • Receipts must match financial disclosure (Right now, we require receipts in the EPP and a financial disclosure but we don’t require that the receipts match the financial disclosures. This year, we were unable to enforce certain things because we lacked this policy.)
  • Final Financial Disclosure Deadline be pushed further away from complaint filing deadline (This year the FFDD was at 12:o1PM on the same day that complaints were due at 5:00PM. We basically didn’t have enough time to thoroughly check the financial disclosures for issues and didn’t end up filing complaints because of it. I would give yourself at least 24 hours to enforce more effectively.)
  • Keep tickets (While the whole talk of elections this year was surrounding tickets, in actuality, all that changed was removing tickets from the Voter’s Guide and EAC website. It is my personal opinion that if any document should provide a neutral platform for all candidates to stand equally, it should be EAC material and to me, this means leaving language about tickets out of these publications. While I think the language in section IV of the EPP is clear, there was confusion this year so I would suggest evaluating the language to make it more clear while still keeping mentions of affiliations outside of ASUW publications.)
  • Link to RSO directory for people to check official officers (This year, we made some changes to the endorsement process that were really effective. We required at least one representative from each RSO who wanted to endorse to come to an EAC co-sponsored forum. This requirement was met by almost every group wishing to endorse. The thing that barred probably 80% of attempted endorsements from being officially listed in the Endorsement Guide was that the RSO officers who signed the form didn’t match those listed in the directory. I would encourage providing a direct link to the RSO directory because it seemed as though there was confusion.)
  • EAC discounts are considered fair market value (We ask candidates to disclose discounts that they receive at fair market value but then we give discounts to candidates to assist with financial burden. You could add a line that clarifies that these discounts, since given equally to all candidates, is considered by the EAC to be fair market value.
  • Less EPP changes, more resources and that the focus this year should be in increasing awareness and focusing on resources. I feel comfortable, with the exception of a few changes, where the EPP is now and would encourage you to focus the energy of the EAC on resources.)
• Read the EPP many times and make notes of things that confuse you to ask the advisers or Internal Policy. These readings and re-readings are really helpful in catching things that are confusing. If they confuse you, they will definitely confuse the student body.
• As previously mentioned, I would encourage you to make better use of the committee  through the EPP process to take both the weight and “blame” off of just the EAC Chair, Vice-Chair and Director of Internal Policy.

To Do List

• Discuss major issues and changes with advisers, IP, and Vice-Chair
• Discuss proposed changes with stakeholders for feedback
• Draft wording and show to advisers for review before sending to Judicial Committee
• Send to Judicial
• Bring to Board!

• We announced on HUB Street while standing on the stair platform with everyone below. I didn’t rent any equipment and it was smooth and easy. You may look into reserving HUB street for reveal day early on in case the HUB may have an event going on those days.
• We printed posters for each position from the RSO center in the HUB and it sufficed. For better quality posters, we recommend the print center in the Communications building. We recommend contacting them ahead of time so they are aware and notified of when we would need to print posters. In addition, we announced the results the following day that voting closed, which gave us enough time to print out the posters for the day of reveal.

To Do List

• Set date and location
• Advertise at voting booths
  • Print slips with time, place, and “you’re invited”
  • hand out to each voter
• Print poster announcements (example can be found in drive)
• You will meet with Coop beforehand to find out who won.
• Announce the winners and then go celebrate!!

• My speaker: Secretary of State Kim Wyman
  • This previous year was her second time speaking with us. Although Kim Wyman was an absolutely amazing speaker each year, we feel it may be time to invite a new speaker for the next year!
  • Structure:
  • introduction
  • keynote speaker for first 20-30 minutes.
  • important information
  • EPP review
  • Complaint procedure
  • draw numbers for ballot order (Find the ping pong balls/box in EAC bins, explain procedure clearly ahead of time to ensure fairness and no confusion.
  • concluding reminders, especially dates
• We used HUB 106 and had it set up for 40-50. The space was comfortable but this also depends on the number of candidates
• All candidates and EAC members are required to go. If a candidate cannot attend, they must do a makeup with you and their name would be listed last in ballot order.

To Do List

• Set date and put it in the candidate’s packet
• Find a keynote speaker
• Reserve a space with a lectern in it
• Create/edit the existing powerpoint presentation
• Locate box of ping pong balls (in office)
• Make sure at least one advisor can attend
• Remind candidates that their attendance is required

• There have been four to five forums in past years. This year, they were:
  • Living Communities Forum (RCSA, IFC, Panhellenic)
  • Senate Forum
  • ASUW Board of Directors Forum / Presidential debate
• In previous years, SAB was another forum that the EAC has willingly hosted, however this year, there was miscommunication in setting the forum date, in which SAB was not able to finalize a room in time, nor would candidates be able to attend.
• I would recommend setting a date in the EPP where groups who want to co-sponsor forums with EAC must reach out to you with a set date, time, and location. This will take a ton of unnecessary stress off of you. Then, you can decide which forums you would like to co sponsor (perhaps using the committee). It may even be helpful to require a written statement from each party requesting co-sponsorship as to why they think their group should be co-sponsored.

To Do List

• Set dates of co-sponsored forums as far in advance as possible (easier if you require a deadline like mentioned above)
• Make sure all venues are wheelchair accessible, get CART captioning, and live-stream
• Communicate requirements to forum hosts
• Advertise for all forums
• Attend all forums to ensure they go smoothly!

• Reference last year’s candidate’s packet in the drive
• Discuss with advisers why certain things are in the candidate’s packet as some of it seems a little unnecessary or outdated
• I found it easiest to make each different document into a PDF and then merge the PDF’s into one online.
• Try to get this done and completed as early during winter quarter as you can. The thing that forced me to wait the longest was updated job descriptions and bylaws from Board, but do the best you can!
• It takes longer than you think it will so be sure to allot the proper time!

• Three internship positions (You can find detailed job descriptions in the Google Drive)
  • Outreach
  • Volunteer and Operations
  • Programming
• OComm will likely have an intern dedicated to EAC this year again, as we require many designs/posters to be completed for us!
• Applications should be released near the beginning of the quarter.
• This year, our interns answered primarily to the Vice-Chair to balance workload of Chair. This seemed to be effective but proceed however you think will work best for you!
• Meeting with interns once a week outside of committee meetings (separate or all-together – we varied by quarter)
• Delegate to your interns! Give them as much responsibility as is reasonable for interns! I can’t stress enough how important delegation will be to keep you at a safe level of stress through this process!

• It is helpful to note throughout the elections process things that are working and things that aren’t (particularly about the EPP). I kept a running list and that made transitions easier.
• Meet with Vice-Chair, IP, and advisers separately after elections to discuss things that they see as important during transition
• Present about elections to board to get feedback

• Vice-Chair should work on this with OComm
• This takes a ton of work, get as much done ahead of time as possible!
• I highly suggest releasing the voter’s guide on a day when the Daily is not publishing their endorsements. The Voter’s Guide is published as a slip-in inside the Daily and having their endorsements in the same doc presents a conflict in my opinion!

To Do List

• Do UUF (as soon as possible)
  • Note that power will be required and that there will be amplified sound
• Rent tables and canopies from the RSO center, or Aurora Rents if unavailable
• Complete UW Driver Safety/Awareness training in order to rent/drive a truck around!
• Contact Rainy Dawg Radio to DJ event
• We gave intern and subcommittee full responsibility to come up with how they wanted to run kick-off fair and then made purchases with our approval. This was nice because it took the planning off of us.
• Touch base regularly with intern to ensure that donations are being acquired
• Create a volunteer schedule for the kick-off fair

General Notes

• Get as many volunteers in morning and evenings as you can.
• Transition time between day and evening voting booths should be two hours, not one, if possible. It is impossible to transfer four voting booths in an hour and we were late because of it most days to set up.

Pre- To Do List

• Get approval to be tabling at each of the inside locations
• Get UUF’s for the outdoor locations
• Reserve any necessary equipment
• Check in with intern regularly to ensure volunteer spaces are being filled
• Have advisors reserve walkie-talkies
• Have committee members reserve laptops (two per station with two extra)
• Ensure that black boxes have all supplies in them

Voting Station Supply List

• ASUW Tent
• Table
• 2 Chairs
• Black box (in 121 cabinet)
  • voting booth instructions
  • contact information
  • complaint procedure
  • EAC complaint forms
  • giveaway stickers
• Voter’s Guides
• Endorsement guide
• 2 laptops
• Giveaways
  • stickers
  • drinks
  • snacks
  • Food
• Walkie talkie