Re: [DSNC] Digest for davissquarenc@googlegroups.com - 6 updates in 3 topics

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Epstein Household

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Sep 7, 2025, 4:45:31 PMSep 7
to daviss...@googlegroups.com
Hello,

On seeing that our ballot submission issue was mentioned while we were away, we wanted to clarify that the election volunteers were able to find a reasonable work-around that allowed us to complete our voting process successfully.

Thank you for your quick response and assistance in resolving this matter. We appreciate your dedication to ensuring a smooth election process.

Regards,

Alex and Christina Epstein

5 Windsor Rd

On Tue, Aug 26, 2025 at 1:40 PM <daviss...@googlegroups.com> wrote:
jlau...@comcast.net <jlau...@comcast.net>: Aug 25 07:12PM

For reasons given elsewhere, we might also look at the n-votes-for -n-offices model used in Somerville for at-large City Council races. In the DSNC case this would mean that the top nine vote-getters would be winners, subject to 'bumping' if the five non-executive board members fail to cover among them all four quota categories,
 
Lee
________________
Josiah Lee Auspitz
17 Chapel Street
Somerville, MA 02144
Landline phone: 617-628-6228 fax: 617-628-9441
Phones do not receive text messages
 
________________________________
From: daviss...@googlegroups.com <daviss...@googlegroups.com> on behalf of geniehainsworth <genieha...@gmail.com>
Sent: Monday, August 25, 2025 12:25 PM
To: Davis Square Neighborhood Council <daviss...@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: [DSNC] DSNC Elections: Background on our voting system
 
Regarding this:
> Re randomness: There are two main types of STV: the one with random draw that I chose because it seemed easier to do in person and understand; and fractional transfer, which is nice because it avoids random events, but involves a lot more math. One of the things I'll be looking for on tally night is whether the random draw is something people dislike strongly enough to justify talking about a switch.
 
Could we also (post-election) look at whether the outcome would have been different if we'd used the fractional transfer method?
It seems like there will be a lot of random drawing.
-Genie
 
On Monday, August 25, 2025 at 3:43:22 AM UTC-4 Christopher Beland wrote:
On Sun, 2025-08-24 at 13:32 -0700, Frank Mals wrote:
> and might not have had enough time to complete the questionnaire in
> the compacted timeline they were given. This is just more evidence
> that the process was too short.
 
In city, state, and federal elections, there's usually no such thing as
an official questionnaire. Voters might be given the candidate's name,
address, party, and whether or not they are an incumbent, but it's
generally left up to private organizations like media outlets and NGOs
to ask questions and publish the answers. It's great that for our
neighborhood, the election committee put in the work to ask questions
and publish answers, and didn't just leave it up to candidates and
voters and interest groups to figure that out. But a healthy democracy
also needs independent civil society groups and activists.
 
The way to make sure your high-priority questions were included in the
official questionnaire, if you think that's very important, would have
been to join the election committee and make suggestions.
 
But I think major stakeholder groups like Davis Square Village have
plenty of traction to get the attention of serious candidates. The two-
month election clock started at the end of June. DSV could have spent
all of July putting together a list of questions and sent it out right
after the candidate list was set on July 28, in time to get responses
before voting started.
 
The election schedule for next year is already set in the bylaws, so
you can start thinking about that now if you really need more than 30
days to do a thing which it seems could be done in a few hours worth of
meetings.
 
> ordinance certainly would be. I appreciate your candor as a
> candidate in expressing that your are comfortable with an outcome
> like this.
 
Well, trying to gerrymander out certain constituencies because of fear
they might vote a certain way doesn't sound inclusive either; I'd
rather win or lose an election fair and square.
 
In city, state, and federal elections, certain voters "pack the polls"
as well...because they care passionately about an issue or candidate.
This is called "turnout" and "getting out the vote" and is generally
considered a good thing.
 
When abolishing rent control was on the statewide ballot in 1994, was
it unfair that landlords were allowed to "pack the polls" and vote for
it? Was it unfair that renters were allowed to "pack the polls" and
vote against it? Was it unfair that people who are neither got to vote
on a matter that didn't personally affect them? Or should they have
been the only ones to decide it?
 
All of our elections are biased by passionate interest groups showing
up and a lot of indifferent or otherwise busy people not bothering to
vote. We could fix this bias by making voting mandatory. Or we could
just not have elections, and run our democracy with sortition (picking
a representative sample of people at random to make decisions, like we
do with jury duty). But I think it's a stretch to say the DSNC process
is substantially less democratic than our current government elections.
 
In the meantime, the good news is that there are tens of thousands of
residents in Somerville, Cambridge, Medford, and Arlington who are
eligible to vote in DSNC elections. Dozens or even hundreds of self-
interested people can be swamped by an effective "get out the vote"
effort on the the "right" side, whatever you think that might be.
 
-B.
 
--
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rona twofisch.com <ro...@twofisch.com>: Aug 25 07:18PM

After we see how this runs, we’ll know a lot more. Then we can have a constructive conversation about what works for our nonprofit.
 
Rona
 
From: 'jlau...@comcast.net' via Davis Square Neighborhood Council <daviss...@googlegroups.com>
Sent: Monday, August 25, 2025 3:12 PM
To: geniehainsworth <genieha...@gmail.com>; Davis Square Neighborhood Council <daviss...@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: [DSNC] DSNC Elections: Background on our voting system
 
For reasons given elsewhere, we might also look at the n-votes-for -n-offices model used in Somerville for at-large City Council races. In the DSNC case this would mean that the top nine vote-getters would be winners, subject to 'bumping' if the five non-executive board members fail to cover among them all four quota categories,
 
Lee
________________
Josiah Lee Auspitz
17 Chapel Street
Somerville, MA 02144
Landline phone: 617-628-6228 fax: 617-628-9441
Phones do not receive text messages
________________________________
From: daviss...@googlegroups.com<mailto:davissquarenc@googlegroups.com> <daviss...@googlegroups.com<mailto:davissquarenc@googlegroups.com>> on behalf of geniehainsworth <genieha...@gmail.com<mailto:geniehainsworth@gmail.com>>
Sent: Monday, August 25, 2025 12:25 PM
To: Davis Square Neighborhood Council <daviss...@googlegroups.com<mailto:davissquarenc@googlegroups.com>>
Subject: Re: [DSNC] DSNC Elections: Background on our voting system
 
Regarding this:
> Re randomness: There are two main types of STV: the one with random draw that I chose because it seemed easier to do in person and understand; and fractional transfer, which is nice because it avoids random events, but involves a lot more math. One of the things I'll be looking for on tally night is whether the random draw is something people dislike strongly enough to justify talking about a switch.
 
Could we also (post-election) look at whether the outcome would have been different if we'd used the fractional transfer method?
It seems like there will be a lot of random drawing.
-Genie
On Monday, August 25, 2025 at 3:43:22 AM UTC-4 Christopher Beland wrote:
On Sun, 2025-08-24 at 13:32 -0700, Frank Mals wrote:
> and might not have had enough time to complete the questionnaire in
> the compacted timeline they were given. This is just more evidence
> that the process was too short.
 
In city, state, and federal elections, there's usually no such thing as
an official questionnaire. Voters might be given the candidate's name,
address, party, and whether or not they are an incumbent, but it's
generally left up to private organizations like media outlets and NGOs
to ask questions and publish the answers. It's great that for our
neighborhood, the election committee put in the work to ask questions
and publish answers, and didn't just leave it up to candidates and
voters and interest groups to figure that out. But a healthy democracy
also needs independent civil society groups and activists.
 
The way to make sure your high-priority questions were included in the
official questionnaire, if you think that's very important, would have
been to join the election committee and make suggestions.
 
But I think major stakeholder groups like Davis Square Village have
plenty of traction to get the attention of serious candidates. The two-
month election clock started at the end of June. DSV could have spent
all of July putting together a list of questions and sent it out right
after the candidate list was set on July 28, in time to get responses
before voting started.
 
The election schedule for next year is already set in the bylaws, so
you can start thinking about that now if you really need more than 30
days to do a thing which it seems could be done in a few hours worth of
meetings.
 
> ordinance certainly would be. I appreciate your candor as a
> candidate in expressing that your are comfortable with an outcome
> like this.
 
Well, trying to gerrymander out certain constituencies because of fear
they might vote a certain way doesn't sound inclusive either; I'd
rather win or lose an election fair and square.
 
In city, state, and federal elections, certain voters "pack the polls"
as well...because they care passionately about an issue or candidate.
This is called "turnout" and "getting out the vote" and is generally
considered a good thing.
 
When abolishing rent control was on the statewide ballot in 1994, was
it unfair that landlords were allowed to "pack the polls" and vote for
it? Was it unfair that renters were allowed to "pack the polls" and
vote against it? Was it unfair that people who are neither got to vote
on a matter that didn't personally affect them? Or should they have
been the only ones to decide it?
 
All of our elections are biased by passionate interest groups showing
up and a lot of indifferent or otherwise busy people not bothering to
vote. We could fix this bias by making voting mandatory. Or we could
just not have elections, and run our democracy with sortition (picking
a representative sample of people at random to make decisions, like we
do with jury duty). But I think it's a stretch to say the DSNC process
is substantially less democratic than our current government elections.
 
In the meantime, the good news is that there are tens of thousands of
residents in Somerville, Cambridge, Medford, and Arlington who are
eligible to vote in DSNC elections. Dozens or even hundreds of self-
interested people can be swamped by an effective "get out the vote"
effort on the the "right" side, whatever you think that might be.
 
-B.
--
Davis Square Neighborhood Council · https://DavisSquareNC.org · https://linktr.ee/DavisSquareNC
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Ann Camara <somervi...@aol.com>: Aug 25 11:18PM

Yes
 
 
Sent from the all new AOL app for iOS
 
 
On Monday, August 25, 2025, 3:18 PM, rona twofisch.com <ro...@twofisch.com> wrote:
 
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After we see how this runs, we’ll know a lot more. Then we can have a constructive conversation about what works for our nonprofit.

 

Rona

 

From: 'jlau...@comcast.net' via Davis Square Neighborhood Council <daviss...@googlegroups.com>
Sent: Monday, August 25, 2025 3:12 PM
To: geniehainsworth <genieha...@gmail.com>; Davis Square Neighborhood Council <daviss...@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: [DSNC] DSNC Elections: Background on our voting system

 

For reasons given elsewhere, we might also look at the n-votes-for -n-offices model used in Somerville for at-large City Council races.  In the DSNC case this would mean that the top nine vote-getters would be winners, subject to 'bumping' if the five non-executive board members fail to cover among them all four quota categories,

 

Lee

________________
Josiah Lee Auspitz
17 Chapel Street 

Somerville, MA 02144 

Landline phone: 617-628-6228 fax: 617-628-9441

Phones do not receive text messages

From:daviss...@googlegroups.com <daviss...@googlegroups.com> on behalf of geniehainsworth <genieha...@gmail.com>
Sent: Monday, August 25, 2025 12:25 PM
To: Davis Square Neighborhood Council <daviss...@googlegroups.com>
Subject: Re: [DSNC] DSNC Elections: Background on our voting system

 

Regarding this:

> Re randomness: There are two main types of STV: the one with random draw that I chose because it seemed easier to do in person and understand; and fractional transfer, which is nice because it avoids random events, but involves a lot more math. One of the things I'll be looking for on tally night is whether the random draw is something people dislike strongly enough to justify talking about a switch.

 

Could we also (post-election) look at whether the outcome would have been different if we'd used the fractional transfer method?

It seems like there will be a lot of random drawing.

-Genie

On Monday, August 25, 2025 at 3:43:22 AM UTC-4 Christopher Beland wrote:

 
On Sun, 2025-08-24 at 13:32 -0700, Frank Mals wrote:
> and might not have had enough time to complete the questionnaire in
> the compacted timeline they were given.  This is just more evidence
> that the process was too short.
 
In city, state, and federal elections, there's usually no such thing as
an official questionnaire. Voters might be given the candidate's name,
address, party, and whether or not they are an incumbent, but it's
generally left up to private organizations like media outlets and NGOs
to ask questions and publish the answers. It's great that for our
neighborhood, the election committee put in the work to ask questions
and publish answers, and didn't just leave it up to candidates and
voters and interest groups to figure that out. But a healthy democracy
also needs independent civil society groups and activists.
 
The way to make sure your high-priority questions were included in the
official questionnaire, if you think that's very important, would have
been to join the election committee and make suggestions.
 
But I think major stakeholder groups like Davis Square Village have
plenty of traction to get the attention of serious candidates. The two-
month election clock started at the end of June. DSV could have spent
all of July putting together a list of questions and sent it out right
after the candidate list was set on July 28, in time to get responses
before voting started.
 
The election schedule for next year is already set in the bylaws, so
you can start thinking about that now if you really need more than 30
days to do a thing which it seems could be done in a few hours worth of
meetings.
 
> ordinance certainly would be.  I appreciate your candor as a
> candidate in expressing that your are comfortable with an outcome
> like this.
 
Well, trying to gerrymander out certain constituencies because of fear
they might vote a certain way doesn't sound inclusive either; I'd
rather win or lose an election fair and square.
 
In city, state, and federal elections, certain voters "pack the polls"
as well...because they care passionately about an issue or candidate.
This is called "turnout" and "getting out the vote" and is generally
considered a good thing.
 
When abolishing rent control was on the statewide ballot in 1994, was
it unfair that landlords were allowed to "pack the polls" and vote for
it? Was it unfair that renters were allowed to "pack the polls" and
vote against it? Was it unfair that people who are neither got to vote
on a matter that didn't personally affect them? Or should they have
been the only ones to decide it?
 
All of our elections are biased by passionate interest groups showing
up and a lot of indifferent or otherwise busy people not bothering to
vote. We could fix this bias by making voting mandatory. Or we could
just not have elections, and run our democracy with sortition (picking
a representative sample of people at random to make decisions, like we
do with jury duty). But I think it's a stretch to say the DSNC process
is substantially less democratic than our current government elections.
 
In the meantime, the good news is that there are tens of thousands of
residents in Somerville, Cambridge, Medford, and Arlington who are
eligible to vote in DSNC elections. Dozens or even hundreds of self-
interested people can be swamped by an effective "get out the vote"
effort on the the "right" side, whatever you think that might be.
 
-B.

 
--
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Davis Square Neighborhood Council <daviss...@gmail.com>: Aug 26 10:37AM -0400

Hello all,
 
It appears that some of the messages in this thread were flagged by Google
Groups for manual approval (we had to set some filters tightly because of
duct cleaning scams). Therefore, the posting of those messages was delayed
and they only just went out.
 
I apologize that I didn't see the messages sooner, and I hope that this
doesn't make anything awkward.
 
Best,
Zev
 
On Tue, Aug 26, 2025 at 10:34 AM 'Ann Camara' via Davis Square Neighborhood
Zachary Yaro <zmy...@gmail.com>: Aug 25 04:29PM -0700

I think our first full election was generally run very well, and I was glad
to hear some people describe it as one of the most pleasant voting
experiences they have ever had. I was also beyond disappointed, after the
long hours we spent on maximizing representation while drafting the bylaws,
to read about Alex Epstein's experience and the dismissive prioritization
of scheduling over enfranchisement (though I am glad that was rectified
later), and then additionally disappointed to experience the same thing
myself.
 
I drafted an amendment to §5.4 of the bylaws
<https://docs.google.com/document/d/1JjuovwnwtsCpl0LXuHZBSfR-9slTEiTYpEXoaXqBMmY/edit> that
I hope will further codify the prioritization of representation in the
DSNC. Per Article 9, could this please be on the agenda next meeting?
 
Thank you,
Zachary Yaro
jlau...@comcast.net <jlau...@comcast.net>: Aug 25 08:30PM

As background for today's agenda item on the Little White Church, the City's Public Records office has kindly supplied the following materials:
 
 
--2018 Facilities Maintenance Report estimating renovation and repair cost at ~$6.8M , along with an interpretive email from Richard E. Raiche, Director of Infrastructure and Asset Management;
 
 
--2021 Community Services Activities Master Plan estimating demolition and construction costs for a four-story replacement Community Center+ Offices or Residences at ~$20M;
 
 
--2022 study for a Somerville Supervised Consumption Site rejecting 45 College Avenue on the basis of the 2018 cost estimate.
 
If there is further interest by any group or committee, I'd be happy to transmit the above documents. I am not able to devote myself to this project at this time.
 
Lee
_________________
Josiah Lee Auspitz
17 Chapel Street
Somerville, MA 02144
Landline phone: 617-628-6228 fax: 617-628-9441
Phones do not receive text messages
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