The 2017 Wikimedia Foundation elections will be held in April–June 2017. Members of the Wikimedia community will have the opportunity to elect candidates for Board of Trustees, Funds Dissemination Committee and Funds Dissemination Committee Ombudsperson.

The elections will be held securely using SecurePoll software. Votes are secret, and no one from the Election Committee, the Board, or anyone on the Wikimedia Foundation staff has access to them. The encryption key for the election is held by an independent third party; once activated, the election is halted. Some personally identifiable data on voters (for instance, IP address, user agent, and other data that is substantially similar to that obtained by the Checkuser tool) is viewable by a select few persons who audit and tally the election (the election committee).

Voters submit votes using a Support/Neutral/Oppose system. The votes will be tallied and the candidates will be ranked by percentage of support, defined as the number of votes cast in support of the candidate divided by the total number of votes cast for the candidate ("neutral" preferences are not counted, so this is the sum of support and oppose votes). The candidates with the highest percentage of support will be recommended to the Board of Trustees for appointment.

From May 1, 2017 (00:00 UTC), members of the Wikimedia community will have the opportunity to vote in the Board of Trustees election for:

• Three members of the Board of Trustees to serve a three-year term which will expire in 2020. The Board of Trustees is the ultimate governing authority of the Wikimedia Foundation, a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization registered in the United States. The Wikimedia Foundation manages many diverse projects such as Wikipedia and Commons.

The election committee will announce the results on or before May 21 2017. Detailed results will be available.

From June 3, 2017 (00:00 UTC), members of the Wikimedia community will have the opportunity to vote in the Funds Dissemination Committee elections for:

• Five members of the Funds Dissemination Committee to serve a two–year term which will expire in 2019.
• One Funds Dissemination Committee Ombudsperson to serve a two-year term which will expire in 2019.

The election committee will announce the results on or before June 16, 2017. Detailed results will be available.

Editors

You may vote from any one registered account you own on a Wikimedia wiki. You may only vote once, regardless of how many accounts you own. To qualify, this one account must:

• not be blocked on more than one project;

• and not be a bot;

• and have made at least 300 edits before 1 April 2017 across Wikimedia wikis;

• and have made at least 20 edits between 1 October 2016 and 1 April 2017.

The AccountEligibility tool can be used to quickly verify basic editor voting eligibility.

Developers

Developers qualify to vote if they:

• Are Wikimedia server administrators with shell access;

• Or have commit access and have made at least one merged commits in git to Wikimedia Foundation utilized repos between 1 October 2016 and 1 April 2017.

Wikimedia Foundation staff and contractors

Current Wikimedia Foundation staff and contractors qualify to vote if they have been employed by the Foundation as of 1 April 2017.

Wikimedia movement affiliate staff and contractors

Current Wikimedia Chapter, thematic organization or user group staff and contractors qualify to vote if they have been employed by their organization as of 1 April 2017.

Wikimedia Foundation board members, Advisory board members, FDC committee members

Current and former members of the Wikimedia Foundation Board of Trustees, the Wikimedia Foundation Advisory Board and the Funds Dissemination Committee are qualified to vote.

All candidates must meet the requirements for voters, as well as role–specific requirements.

• Information for Board of Trustees candidates
• Information for Funds Dissemination Committee candidates
• Information for Funds Dissemination Committee Ombudsperson candidates

Board of Trustees elections

• 20 April: Deadline for candidate submissions and Identification verification
• 21 April – 1 May: Questions and discussion between candidates and community
• 1–14 May: Voting
• 15–19 May: Vote-checking
• 20 May: Goal for announcement of results

Funds Dissemination Committee elections

• 28 May: Deadline for candidate submissions and identification verification
• 29 May – 2 June: Questions and discussion between candidates and community
• 3–11 June: Voting
• 12–14 June: Vote-checking
• 15 June: Goal for announcement of results