Relatio de officio comitiis administrandis constituendo (Nova Roma)

A senatorial decree concerning the establishment of an office for administering the elections.

I. The appointment or selection of election officials has had a varied history in Nova Roma. In the very early days, they formed part of the vigintisexviri. In recent years they have been manually selected by presiding magistrates, often last-minute. It has proven somewhat difficult to guarantee consistency in policy, election official performance, as well as introducing new citizens to the electoral process. Often the burden of training has consistently fallen to citizens already incumbered. There is potential for a better managed process and an unbiased management of our elections and provide a more lucrative agency specializing in election administration.

II. With this decree, the senate hereby creates a new office, the Officium rerum comitialium (Office of electoral affairs). This office falls under the purview of the senate but is answerable to all magistrates who may call the various comitia (consules, praetores and tribuni plebes). Heading this office will be a senate-appointed commissioner, the Praepositus Rerum Comitialium (Head of electoral affairs), who will have the ultimate responsibility for carrying-out the function of the office. Only the senate may appoint or replace the praepositus rerum comitialium. The senate may also instigate new policy, via a senatus consultum, that the office must incorporate, citing this decree.

III. The primary objectives of the Officium rerum comitialium are as follows:

A. Raise, train and sustain election officials; namely rogatores, diribitores, and custodes.

B. Support and manage the voting infrastructure used in the various Nova Roma comitia.

C. Support the maintenance of the official voting roles of the tribes and centuries.

D. Provide support to magistrates through the deployment of election officials and subject matter experts.

E. Provide education to citizens on the voting process.

IV. The first task of the Praepositus rerum comitialium is to publish a charter managing the policy, process and procedures of the office, the training it provides, and how the office is to achieve the objectives of article III. The first version of this charter is to be published and signed by the praepositus no later than the pr. Kal. Quint. (30 June). The charter is to be published to a new department page on the NR Wiki, which will also list details about the office. The praepositus may recruit any number of subject matter experts to the office to support him or her in forming the office and producing the charter. These office members are to be listed on the new department page in the NR Wiki. The senate stipulates the following minimum policy regulations that must be included in the charter:

A. Concerning a chapter about recruiting or raising new election officials:

i. Those seeking to apply as an election official apply directly to the office by a means determined by the office.

ii. To apply, citizens must have held the cives optimo iure for at least 6 months, and be assiduus.

iii. To apply, citizens must have uploaded a true, unaltered image, to their Album Civium profile and must sit a short video interview with the praepositus.

B. Concerning a chapter about training election officials:

i. Newly inducted election officials may only be appointed as an observator in the first instance, to watch and learn from a live vote counting process, the duration to be determined by the office but it must last at least one comitia session as a minimum.

ii. All election officials are to be able to access standard operating procures, produced by the office, on the vote counting and reporting process, to be included in the charter either as a chapter or as an annex.

iii. With the duration to be determined by the office, a citizen must first serve as an observator, before being permitted to serve as a diribitor, before being permitted to serve as a rogator, before being permitted to serve as a custos.

iv. One prerequisite for an official to be promoted or appointed to custos is that the member must of also been elected as a magistrate previously and must have held the cives optimo iure for at least 4 years.

v. One prerequisite for an official to be promoted or appointed to rogator is that the member must have held the cives optimo iure for at least 3 years.

vi. All promotions or appointments to a higher tier of election official must have the consent of the member and the member must sit and pass a board chaired by the praepositus, including at least one other election official of the level the member is promoting to, and an optional external magistrate at the invite of the praepositus.

C. Concerning a chapter about sustaining (managing) election officials:

i. A role of eligible election officials and their type of office is to be published to the office Nova Roma Wiki page.

ii. With sufficient numbers, as determined by the office, election officials are to designated into either a primary or reserve tier, whereby primary members are "on-call" to manage voting in any comitia that arises during their designated period while serving in this tier, the latter acts as a back-up should a primary member be unable to support a current comitia session.

iii. The period of rotation in which an election official occupies the primary tier or reserve tier is to be, at a minimum one month and a maximum of one year, ultimately determined by the office.

iv. Election officials are awarded census points according to law, provided they have served in at last one comitia session in any 12-month period.

v. Election officials can only be awarded census points once in any 12-month period, even if they serve as a different type of election official across multiple comitia.

vi. The Nova Roman Wiki page for the office must keep a complete record of all comitia that any given election official has served in, and in what capacity.

vii. Election officials, deemed Officiales rerum comitialium, shall be designated as junior officials (Officiales minoris ordinis), the observator and diribitor; and senior officials (Officiales maioris ordinis), the rogator and custos.

viii. The praepositus may downgrade the level of an election official for inadequate performance for a temporary period of time that is 12 months or less, as defined by the office, but must include an achievable performance improvement plan, formatted and defined according to the office.

ix. Election officials may resign by notifying the praepositus in writing, with past election officials recorded on the Nova Roman Wiki office page.

x. Past election officials may return and be reinstated to his or her previous level.

D. Concerning a chapter about voting infrastructure:

i. The current approved voting infrastructure is a Gmail service, to be used for all future comitia, that accepts either email votes from citizens or a Google form or forms for citizens to lodge their votes.

ii. New voting infrastructure proposed by the office must be approved by the praepositus and then submitted as a formal request to the senate for approval via senatus consultum.

iii. The voting infrastructure must be able to keep voting records for a minimum of five years.

iv. The voting infrastructure must be able to be accessed and audited by the Officium rei informaticae.

E. Concerning a chapter about support and maintenance of the official voting roles of the tribes and centuries:

i. The office is to take on management of the live roles of tribes and centuries of Nova Roma, but are not permitted to edit those roles.

ii. The office must be able to enable constant access to the roles by the Officum Censorium who are the only ones permitted to edit the roles.

iii. The rogator duties must specify procedures (not necessarily in this chapter) to have them cross verify live voter roles with the Album Civium and work with the Officum Censorium on any identified discrepancies.

F. Concerning a the chapter about providing support to magistrates:

i. Magistrates should be able to identify or be provided a list of eligible (primary) election officials for any given comitia session.

ii. Magistrates are no longer required to specify the election officials in any pronouncement of a comitia.

iii. Should there be permitted variations as to the senate-approved way voting or votes are submitted, the options should be presented to any hosting magistrate for them to decide.

G. Concerning a chapter about provide education to citizens on the voting process:

i. The Nova Roman Wiki page for the office should include a section to inform citizens on how the voting processes works and link to other sources that may support education on voting in the comitia.

ii. The rogator duties must specify procedures (not necessarily in this chapter) about how to inform voters about the voting process during a live session of the comitia.

H. Concerning a chapter about the roles and responsibilities of the praepositus:

i. The praepositus may not be an election official themselves (observator, diribitor, rogator or custos).

ii. Comitia hosting magistrates will primarily make requests and seek information through the praepositus.

iii. The praepositus may appoint a deputy, which may also be a senior election official themselves (rogator or custos).

I. Concerning a chapter about the initial and contingency operations of the office:

i. The praepositus must invite and appoint initial election officials to permanently fill the office upon the office first being established; this includes only one custos, only one rogator and only three diribitores.

ii. If the number of election officials ever falls below the initial appointment level as defined in the article above, this is considered contingency operations and the praepositus must temporarily fill the vacant positions.

iii. The praepositus may request that the senate sends quaestors to fill vacant positions until such time as the praepositus has recruited new election officials.

V. The senate hereby appoints #### as the inaugural Praepositus rerum comitialium.