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MEDICAL
TECHNOLOGY
ELECTRONIC BALLOTS
SAVE BCMS TIME AND MONEY
By Mike W. Thomas
The Bexar County Medical Society held its first election this year voted and send automatic reminders to encourage higher turnout
using electronic ballots and the results were very positive, said and participation.
BCMS Chief Operating Officer Melody Newsom.
The electronic ballots are more robust than the paper ballots they
"Electronic voting saves our physician members time and is have replaced and can include pictures and curriculum vitae about
less expensive to administer in terms of staff time and hard each candidate and even campaign messages.
costs," Newsom said. “In the past it usually took two to three
hours for the physicians and staff on our Nominating Commit- This year more than 2,150 electronic ballots were sent out along
tee to review and count all the ballots. Now the results are au- with 400 hard or printed ballots to those who requested them. Vot-
tomatically calculated and it is all very secure.” ing is restricted to active members and does not include students,
residents, military, life or retired members.
One year it took nearly five hours for the committee to count the
ballots in a closely contested race, she said. More than 1,000 ballots “We will still send mail-in ballots to those who cannot vote elec-
were cast and they had to be counted three times as the race was tronically, but from here on most voting will be done electronically,”
decided by fewer than five votes. Newsom said.
Newsom said she tested the new voting system to make sure If you did not receive an electronic ballot or a mail-in ballot and
no one can vote twice. The system can also track who has not feel that you should have, please call the BCMS Membership De-
partment at 210-301-4398 or email membership@bcms.org.
AFFIDAVIT OF RESULTS
BCMS 2017 ELECTION FOR 2018 OFFICERS
President-elect Treasurer Board of Directors
Adam Ratner, MD John R. Holcomb, MD John D. Edwards, MD
Gerardo Ortega, MD
Vice President Secretary Manuel Quinones, MD
Gerald Greenfield, MD Kristi Clark, MD
22 San Antonio Medicine • November 2017
