Dombrovska showed her correspondence with Falko via online voting: «I swore to serve Mykolaiv, not Zoom cloud storage»

Deputy Tetiana Dombrovska published the response of the city council secretary after claiming that the voting was not in order. Photo: NikVesti

Mykolaiv City Council deputy Tetiana Dombrovska has published official correspondence with the city council secretary Dmytro Falk regarding the results of the roll-call vote to replace the city hall structure, where she claims that «abstained from voting», while the protocol indicates «for».

This refers to the voting during the last session of the city council in a Zoom conference, where the new structure of the city hall was approved, Tetiana Dombrovska wrote on Facebook.

According to the deputy, in the protocol of the roll-call vote, her choice «abstained» was reflected as «for». She immediately drew attention to the discrepancy and asked the mayor to correct the protocol.

In response to her appeal, the City Council Secretary Dmytro Falko replied that the results of remote voting are recorded and stored in Zoom, and the process is encrypted and excludes tampering, so it is impossible to distort the votes.

«The results of the roll-call vote of the remote meeting are additionally recorded by the municipal enterprise «and the City Information and Computing Centre» using technical means and software. I would like to inform you that meetings of the standing committees and sessions of the Mykolaiv City Council of the VIII convocation are held using the Zoom platform. According to the director of the municipal enterprise «City Information and Computing Centre» Yevhen Bohachenko, the data exchange channel between the client device and the Zoom cloud server is encrypted online and prevents interference with the information exchange process, so distortion of the online voting results is excluded. The results of roll-call voting are automatically saved in the Zoom cloud infrastructure. Employees of the municipal enterprise «City Information and Computing Centre» have constant access to them in their office and download them after the event», reads the response of the City Council Secretary Dmytro Falko.

Secretary Dmytro Falko's response to Tetiana Dombrovska's appeal. The deputy published the document on her Facebook page

Secretary Dmytro Falko's response to Tatiana Dombrovska's appeal. The deputy published the document on her Facebook page

In response to this position of the city council, Tetiana Dombrovska wrote that if her demands are ignored, the deputy is ready to apply to law enforcement agencies.

«I swore to serve the community of Mykolaiv and the people of Ukraine, not your cloud-based online services. The law and the council's Rules of Procedure clearly state that if a deputy claims a violation of the procedure before the session is closed, the council must return to the issue and re-vote. I insist on restoring my actual expression of will — «abstained». And if my demand is ignored again, I will be forced to apply to law enforcement agencies and defend my rights in court,» said Tetiana Dombrovska.

As a reminder, on 28 August, members of Mykolaiv City Council approved a revised structure of the city hall's executive bodies.