Peter Morales elected UUA president

The Rev. Peter Morales has been elected the next president of the Unitarian Universalist Association by a vote by 2,061 to 1,481.

Local media coverage of UUA General Assembly

Both daily newspapers in Salt Lake City published articles today about yesterday's interfaith rally for immigrant families sponsored by the Unitarian Universalist Association. Both papers quoted the Roman Catholic, Episcopal, and Unitarian Universalist leaders who spoke at the rally. The Mormon Church-owned Deseret News, however, did not mention Larry Love, the Mormon congregational leader who described the arrest and pending deportation of his Guatemalan wife.

Interfaith rally points to spiritual side of immigration debate (Salt Lake Tribune 6.27.09)

Religious groups show support for immigrants (Deseret News 6.27.09)

KSL-TV reported, meanwhile, on the thunderstorm that ripped the UUA's banner from the front entry tower of the Salt Palace convention center: Northern Utah hit by quick-moving thunderstorm (KSL-TV 6.26.09).

Absentee ballots cast in unprecedented numbers

At Tuesday afternoon's meeting of the UUA Board of Trustees in Salt Lake City, Secretary Paul Rickter reported that more than 1,800 absentee ballots have been submitted for the UUA's presidential election. Other delegates will cast ballots at the General Assembly on Saturday, June 27, between noon and 5:30 p.m.

The number of absentee ballots this year is nearly double what it was in 2001, the last contested presidential election, when 947 (or 29 percent) of the 3,276 ballots cast were absentee ballots. Don Plante of the UUA's General Assembly and conference services staff told UU World in May that approximately 5,000 delegates are eligible to vote in the presidential election. He said that 68 percent of the eligible voters in the 2001 election cast a ballot.

Rickter told his fellow trustees that each ballot will be scanned before being processed by vote-counting software. He said that absentee ballots will be scanned before the end of Saturday's voting, but they will be counted at the same time as votes cast in person.

The Rev. Dr. Laurel Hallman of Dallas and the Rev. Peter Morales of Golden, Colo., are running to succeed the Rev. William G. Sinkford, who is completing his second term as president. See UUA.org's election section for more information about the election.

UUA blogs (and tweets!) General Assembly

In addition to UU World's General Assembly blog—which concentrates on GA business and news—there are several other official sources of General Assembly coverage. As in years past, volunteers will be covering a wide range of GA workshops, worship services, and plenary sessions for UUA.org. Doug Muder, the Rev. Dan Harper, and Deb Weiner are writing at UUA.org's new General Assembly 2009 blog, which welcomes comments.

The UUA is also posting GA updates via Twitter and encourages other Twitterers to tag their General Assembly tweets #uuga2009. Many people are, although you have to be signed in to Twitter to see the their tweets.