REI COOP Election Mockery

  There is no other way to fight the oligarchic approach of the present board of directors that chose to amend the bylaws to allow (in violation of the WA coops regulations?) 3 people they coopted but were not validated by a vote from the membership to remain on board for 3 years. If they also lose the 2026 election, are they going to do the same? and the same in 2027?

 Read the information given on the REI site about voting and eligibility. You do see the mention of a "record date" of December 19 but no detailed explanation about what this means like "you cannot vote if you become a member after this date") while at the very bottom you can read " * to be eligible to vote ... or become a new member in 2025" that is where they should have mentioned clearly "before December 19, 2025".  By not doing it, they misled people who became members later in 2025, only to be denied the"important' right to participate in the 2026 election.  How many people were deceived that way, like I was? How do they plan to compensate for their faulty description of the eligibility? Is there any way to hold them accountable? 

Did you know there was an "eligibility date" ("record date") to be allowed to vote for the 2026 REI board of directors election?   The truth is finally coming out about why I was denied the possibility to vote. I became a member after December 19 that Kerry Reynolds (senior vice president Alliance Advisors) just informed me was what she calls the "eligibility date" ("record date"), claiming in her email she had already mentioned it when this "eligibility date" was never publicized anywhere by REI or by Alliance Advisors.  No apologies, nothing. I wonder how many people were deceived the way I was.

 How many REI members eligible to vote (how many are we, the board does not say) know that their directors still refuse to say how many members voted in the 2025 election and how many votes the respective candidates received (see all the 9 questions still unanswered ).

  This morning I tried to vote, via the reivote.com  then  the page devoted to the vote , reproduced below.

  Excerpt from Alex Halverson's article on March 7, 2025 for the Seattle Times. Note at the end that none of them responded to requests for comments.