Tuesday, June 18, 2013 – Assistant Rabbi Election

June 17, 2013

Dear YISE Member:

This cyberbrief is to remind you about the upcoming Assistant Rabbi Election Meeting. The congregational election meeting will be held on Tuesday, June 18, 2013 from 7:30pm – 9:30 pm in the Arcola Avenue Social Hall. Only Full Members in good standing are entitled to vote. According to the YISE Constitution, husband and wife households are entitled to two votes if both are present. A husband may not cast a vote for his wife and vice versa. Note: For those member households with small children, we recommend that the spouses alternate childcare in order to facilitate each one coming to vote.

The YISE constitution does not allow for absentee ballots. This will hopefully be changed at a general shul meeting in the future.

According to the YISE Constitution, an Assistant Rabbi must be elected by the YISE congregation by a majority of sixty percent (60%) of the votes cast at a special election. At the May 28, 2013 Board of Directors’ meeting, the Board approved the following method to elect an Assistant Rabbi.

  • At the election, Full Members in good standing will be given a ballot with the following two questions:
  1. Would you like YISE to hire an Assistant Rabbi?
    1. Yes
    2. No
  2. Regardless of your answer to the first question, choose your first and second choices out of the three Assistant Rabbi candidates presented.
    1. Rabbi Yechiel Shaffer
    2. Rabbi Binyamin Silver
    3. Rabbi Sandor Shulkes
  • At 9:30 pm, the ballots cast will be tallied. At least sixty percent of votes cast must be in favor of hiring an Assistant Rabbi for the election process to proceed to the next step. If less than sixty percent of votes are in favor of hiring an Assistant Rabbi, the election process ends here.
  • If a minimum of 60% of the votes cast are in favor of hiring an Assistant Rabbi, we will proceed to tally votes on the second ballot question.
  • If any candidate receives 60% of first choice votes, that candidate is elected.
  • If no candidate receives 60% of first choice votes, the procedure continues as follows:
  • The candidate with the fewest first choice votes will be eliminated.
  1. The candidate with the fewest first choice votes will be eliminated.
  2. A second vote tally will then occur. For members who initially selected the eliminated candidate as their first choice, their second choice vote will be utilized in this second tally.
  • If the latter process still does not result in a candidate receiving the 60% majority, an additional election meeting will be held on Thursday, June 20th from 7:30pm – 9:30pm in the Arcola Building Social Hall. The names of the top two candidates from the June 18 election meeting will be on the ballot.
  • Members are asked to check their email to find out if a second election meeting will occur.