Cumulative voting
A voting method that lets a member stack all their votes on one board candidate, but only when the bylaws say so.
Cumulative voting lets a member cast all their votes for one board candidate, or split them among several, instead of one vote per open seat. It is never a default. It exists only if the bylaws or articles specifically authorize it, and a member must announce intent to use it before voting starts, or the option is not available that election.
How the math works
In an ordinary board election, a member gets one vote per open seat: five seats, five votes, one per candidate. Cumulative voting changes the multiplication. A member's total votes equal the number of seats up for election multiplied by the number of votes they are entitled to. They can pour that whole total into one candidate, or spread it across several however they choose.
Five open seats and one vote per membership gives a member five votes to allocate. Under cumulative voting they could give all five to one candidate instead of spreading one vote to each of five different people.
"Every member entitled to vote at any election of directors may cumulate the member's votes and give one candidate a number of votes equal to the number of directors to be elected multiplied by the number of votes to which the member is entitled, or distribute the member's votes on the same principle among as many candidates as the member thinks fit."
Source: California Corporations Code, Section 7615, California Legislative Information
Whether this formula is even available to your association depends entirely on your own articles and bylaws. Check both before assuming the option exists.
Why boards adopt it
Cumulative voting exists to protect minority viewpoints on a board. A group that could never win a straight majority vote can still concentrate its support and land one seat. That same math gives a second, less obvious protection: a director elected this way is harder to remove individually.
Where cumulative voting is authorized, a director cannot be voted off one seat at a time if the votes cast against that removal would have been enough to elect them in a hypothetical full board election run the same way. In practice, this pushes a faction that wants a director gone toward removing the whole board, not just the one member they dislike.
Announcing intent, and undoing it later
A member cannot simply decide to cumulate on election day. The candidate they want to pile votes onto must already be nominated, and the member must give notice of their intent to cumulate at the meeting, before voting begins. Give that notice, and every other member at the meeting may cumulate too, not just the member who spoke up.
Once a cumulative voting provision is in the bylaws or articles, the board cannot quietly remove it. Repealing or amending that provision takes member approval, the same body that put it there in the first place.
Check yourself
Answer before you read the explanation, recalling it is what makes it stick.
Your bylaws authorize cumulative voting for five open seats. A member wants to give all her votes to one candidate but never announced that intent before voting started. What happens to her ballot?
Under a bylaws provision authorizing cumulative voting, a faction with a bare majority tries to remove one disfavored director individually, rather than removing the whole board. What protects that director?
Your association adopted cumulative voting years ago in its bylaws. The board now wants to eliminate it without asking the members. Can the board do that alone?
Sources
- California Corporations Code, Nonprofit Mutual Benefit Corporation Law, Sections 7222 and 7615, California Legislative Information
Related elsewhere in the Academy
Elections
Check your own bylaws and articles for a cumulative voting clause before your next board election, or read how election inspectors run the count.
Whether cumulative voting is authorized at all, and the exact process for announcing intent to use it, varies by state law and by your association's own bylaws and articles of incorporation.