ABA Names 2009 Board Candidates

Petition Process to Place Additional Candidates on the Ballot Open

At its February meeting, the American Booksellers Association's Board of Directors approved the report of the ABA Nominating Committee, chaired by Steve Bercu of BookPeople in Austin, Texas. The Committee presented the Board with the names of three director candidates to serve three-year terms (2009- 2012) on the Board. (Under ABA's bylaws, each year three members of the nine-member Board come to the end of their terms.)

Booksellers nominated as candidates for the upcoming elections are Betsy Burton of The King's English in Salt Lake City, Utah; Becky Anderson of Anderson's Bookshops in Naperville, Illinois; and Beth Puffer of Bank Street Bookstore in New York City. Anderson and Puffer currently serve on the ABA Board, and both are eligible for an additional three-year term.

Leaving the ABA Board in June 2009 is current President Gayle Shanks of Changing Hands Bookstore in Tempe, Arizona.

The Board selected Michael Tucker of Books Inc. in San Francisco as ABA President and Becky Anderson as ABA Vice President/Secretary for one-year terms, beginning June 2009. Their names and those of director candidates will appear on the ballot sent to membership in late March, 60 days prior to the ABA Annual Membership Meeting at BookExpo America.

Under ABA's bylaws, in addition to candidates put forth by the Nominating Committee and approved by the Board, any bookstore member may submit a petition for a director candidate; there is a timeframe of approximately one month to circulate petitions to place names on the ballot. Upon receipt of a valid petition, the Nominating Committee will add the petitioned candidate's name to the Director ballot.

Should bookstore members wish to submit a petition, the following apply:

• A candidate must be an employee or owner of an ABA member bookstore. The member bookstore must be in good standing, and the individual candidate must have at least three years' experience in a bookstore-member company.

• Each petition can present only one candidate.

• All petitions must be submitted by March 20, 2009, to Chair, ABA Nominating Committee, c/o ABA, 200 White Plains Rd., Tarrytown, NY 10591.

• The names on the petition in support of the candidate must reflect at least two percent of ABA Bookstore Members as of January 1, 2009; that is a minimum of 30 signatures. The petition must contain original signatures, the name of the ABA member bookstore, address, and telephone number.

• The names on the petition in support of the candidate must come from at least five states, with representatives of no one state constituting more than 50 percent of the total number of petition signatures.

Upon receipt of a valid petition, the Nominating Committee will add the candidate's name to the ballot sent to ABA membership.

Serving with Bercu on the Nominating Committee were Board member Ken White of SFSU Bookstore in San Francisco; former ABA President Russ Lawrence of Chapter One Book Store in Hamilton, Montana; Andrea Avantaggio of Maria's Bookshop in Durango, Colorado; and Kelly Justice of Fountain Bookstore in Richmond, Virginia.

To help BTW's coverage of the election process, if any bookstore member is working to circulate a petition, please send an e-mail to [email protected].