Effective: July 31, 2019

Rules for city/town submission:

• One entry per city/town will be accepted.
• Entry applications will be accepted from cities and towns of any size. No town is too small or too large to enter. (The city or town filing the entry application, acting through its authorized representative, is referred to in these rules from time to time as the “Applicant”.)
• The town must be located within the state of Minnesota.
• The entry application must be completed and submitted by an official town representative. An official town representative is defined as an individual in a leadership capacity employed by the town’s Visitor and Convention Bureau, the Chamber of Commerce, or Government offices of Mayor or other elected official. By submitting the entry application, the person doing so represents that he or she has actual authority on behalf of the submitting entity to do so.
• Entries must be submitted online at bestmntown.com by 5:00 p.m. CST August 31, 2019. No mailed or emailed submissions will be accepted.
• Each answer to each individual question in the entry application must not exceed the stated maximum character count for that answer.
• By submitting materials to Greenspring Media (publisher of Minnesota Monthly) the Applicant represents that the Applicant possesses all rights to use such material(s) and is in turn assigning those usage rights to Greenspring Media for use across all media, including but not limited to, print, online, video, audio, advertising, and in person in conjunction with the Best MN Town program
• By participating, the Applicant agrees to be bound by these Official Rules and the decisions of Best MN Town, our judges, Minnesota Monthly and Greenspring Media. The decisions of Best MN Town and Minnesota Monthly regarding all aspects of the administration of the application and selection process and prize package, and shall be final and binding in all respects. Best MN Town and Minnesota Monthly will not be responsible for typographical, printing or other inadvertent errors in these Official Rules or in other materials relating to this program.

Best MN Town Methodology:

• On the basis of the content and quality of the entry applications received, the editors and publisher of Minnesota Monthly will narrow the field of Applicants to the top 10 towns.
• The Best MN Town evaluation panel will review and score the top 10 towns. Each entry application will be scored according to the scoring procedures below. The panel vote will contribute 25% toward the total score of each town.
• The top 10 towns will compete in a popular vote hosted on Bestmntown.com. The popular vote will contribute 75% toward the total score of each town.
• The winning town will be selected based on the total number of points from the Panel and Readers’ Choice.

Scoring Procedures:  

Total Points Available.

Each Top 10 Town’s entry application will be evaluated based upon the award of a possible 100 points: (A) 50 points averaged from a panel; and (B) 50 points based upon the outcome of a popular vote.  The points awarded by the panel are combined with points awarded by popular vote, with the highest combined points determining the winning town.

• Evaluation Panel scoring: 50% of Applicant’s total score – possible 50 points
• Popular Vote scoring: 50% of Applicant’s total score – possible 50 points

The consumer vote will be calculated as a percentage of total votes per town capita as measured in 2010 U.S. Census data or other verifiable 3^rd party number if town was not measured in the 2010 U.S. Census. This will be converted to a point value as follows:

80% or greater participation = 50 points

50 – 79.9% participation = 30 points

20% – 49.9% participation = 10 points

19.9% or less participation = 0 points                                                                       

For example, if a town with a 2010 census population of 25,000 receives 5,000 votes, that is a percentage of 20%, entitling that town to an award of 10 points toward the total.

In the event of a tie, in which multiple towns competing for winner have the equivalent point total, the town with the higher popular vote point total will become the winner.

Rules for the Popular Vote:

• Only votes submitted via bestmntown.com will be counted.
• Voters may vote as many times as they want during the competition, but they are limited to 1 vote per day per IP address.
• Voters need not be a resident of the town that they are voting for; however, voters must be a resident of the United States.
• Voting will conclude at midnight September 30, 2019.
• Use of script, macro or any other automated system to vote is prohibited and all such votes will be void.
• Cities/Towns/Businesses are prohibited from obtaining votes by any fraudulent or inappropriate means, including, but not limited to, offering prizes or other inducements to members of the public, vote farming, or engaging in any other activity that artificially inflates the town’s votes.
• Votes cast or received in violation of these Official Rules will be disregarded and disqualified.
• By participating, voters agree to be bound by these Official Rules and the decisions of Best MN Town and Minnesota Monthly. Voters will be opted-in to receive e-mails from the program or those directed by Minnesota Monthly. You can opt-out of the receipt of such e-mails by following the directions on bestmntown.com or in any email received from Minnesota Monthly.

Use of Trademarks. Greenspring Media owns all the rights, title, and interest in its name and logos, including but not limited to Best MN Town, Bestmntown.com, Best Minnesota Town and Minnesota Monthly. None of the Best MN Town or Minnesota Monthly logos may be used, reproduced or published in form or for any purpose without the prior written permission of Greenspring Media.

Other. Best MN Town reserves the right to disqualify persons or towns found tampering with or otherwise abusing any aspect of this program as solely determined by Best MN Town or Minnesota Monthly. In the event the website is compromised by a virus, non-authorized human intervention, tampering or other causes beyond the reasonable control of bestmntown.com that corrupts or impairs the administration, security, fairness or proper operation, Greenspring Media reserves the right in its sole discretion to suspend, modify or terminate the program. Best MN Town will not be responsible for failure to receive town submissions, votes or other electronic communications due to transmission failures or technical failures of any kind, including, without limitation, malfunctioning of any network, hardware or software, whether originating with sender of bestmntown.com. In the event of a dispute, all votes will be deemed to have been submitted by the owner of the ISP account from which they were sent. For these purposes, an ISP account holder shall be defined as the natural person assigned to such ISP account by the Internet access provider, online service provider or other organization responsible for assigning ISP addresses for the domain associated with such ISP account. Any questions regarding the number of votes submitted by the owner of an ISP account shall be resolved by Best MN Town in its sole discretion. The invalidity or unenforceability of any provision of these rules shall not affect the validity or enforceability of any other provision. In the event that any such provision is determined to be invalid or otherwise unenforceable, these rules shall be construed in accordance with their terms as if the invalid or unenforceable provision was not contained herein.  Submission of an entry application by an Applicant does not create a contract or other form of enforceable legal rights of any kind or nature.

The Best MN Town will be required to use the Best MN Town logo + Minnesota Monthly logo in all ads placed using the recognition.