Guest Sara Posted March 28, 2018 at 10:47 PM Report Share Posted March 28, 2018 at 10:47 PM Understanding that Minutes must be maintained for the life of the organization, is it now permissible to digitize Minutes and keep them on a zip drive? Also, re: Minutes, specifically Minutes of Executive Sessions: our organization had Executive Sessions at which the Executive Director of the organization was NOT included. Our Regular Meeting Minutes are maintained in the ED's office in a locked file. Where should the Exec. Session Minutes be maintained? Someone has suggested they also could be maintained in the same locked file, but in a sealed envelope, so it would be known if someone had reviewed the Minutes. Any other suggestions? Thank you for your help. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Who's Coming to Dinner Posted March 29, 2018 at 01:09 AM Report Share Posted March 29, 2018 at 01:09 AM While I believe RONR contemplates only paper and ink, there is no reason your organization could not adopt a rule about keeping the minutes in electronic form. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Joshua Katz Posted March 29, 2018 at 01:09 AM Report Share Posted March 29, 2018 at 01:09 AM Well, I don't know the answer, and I don't think there is a clear answer in RONR. Personally, though, I wouldn't recommend storing files on a zip/flash drive. They can be lost or damaged easily. (Paper can of course be damaged easily, but it's harder to lose a few lockers of papers - although people manage.) I think keeping a hard copy is a good practice. Stay tuned for other answers. On the executive session minutes: I think you should maintain them in such a way that they can't be accessed (easily) by someone not entitled to see them, not just provide a way of detecting access. All minutes should be under the control of the Secretary rather than the ED. It might make sense to have the ED store them so members can access them, but certainly nothing the ED is not supposed to have should be given to the ED. Handing someone a sealed envelope and saying "don't look inside" is too much for most humans, I think. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Josh Martin Posted March 29, 2018 at 12:30 PM Report Share Posted March 29, 2018 at 12:30 PM (edited) 13 hours ago, Guest Sara said: Understanding that Minutes must be maintained for the life of the organization, is it now permissible to digitize Minutes and keep them on a zip drive? People still use zip drives? In any event, yes, the organization is free to store its minutes in whatever manner it wishes. 13 hours ago, Guest Sara said: Our Regular Meeting Minutes are maintained in the ED's office in a locked file. Where should the Exec. Session Minutes be maintained? Someone has suggested they also could be maintained in the same locked file, but in a sealed envelope, so it would be known if someone had reviewed the Minutes. Any other suggestions? If this locked file is only accessible to members of the board (or others that the board has granted permission to view minutes of executive sessions), no additional security is required, although the board could adopt this “sealed envelope” method if it wishes. 11 hours ago, Joshua Katz said: Well, I don't know the answer, and I don't think there is a clear answer in RONR. Personally, though, I wouldn't recommend storing files on a zip/flash drive. They can be lost or damaged easily. (Paper can of course be damaged easily, but it's harder to lose a few lockers of papers - although people manage.) I think keeping a hard copy is a good practice. Stay tuned for other answers. I don’t think it is necessary or desirable to keep a paper copy of the minutes indefinitely. And while it may be difficult to lose a few lockers of paper, it is very easy to lose some of those papers. I concur that storing the minutes on a tiny physical device, however, is not the best method either - I have lost many flash drives myself. The best method, in my opinion, would be to use a file storage service with appropriate security controls. With this method, the minutes will be stored on an offsite server with multiple backups. Edited March 29, 2018 at 12:32 PM by Josh Martin Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
George Mervosh Posted March 29, 2018 at 12:51 PM Report Share Posted March 29, 2018 at 12:51 PM 21 minutes ago, Josh Martin said: People still use zip drives? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Transpower Posted March 29, 2018 at 02:36 PM Report Share Posted March 29, 2018 at 02:36 PM You could store digitized minutes at Dropbox. Then if someone requests to see a particular one, you could send them the Dropbox link. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Benjamin Geiger Posted March 29, 2018 at 06:32 PM Report Share Posted March 29, 2018 at 06:32 PM (edited) Remember the 3-2-1 rule: (At least) 3 copies of your data. (At least) 2 different media. (At least) 1 must be offsite. If you keep your original minutes on your hard drive, I'd recommend an external hard drive for a second copy, and the third copy (and offsite) could be something like Dropbox/OneDrive/Google Drive/etc. That way, if your hard drives fail, or you make a mistake during backup and destroy your local copies, or your headquarters burns down, then you have a remaining backup to go to. EDIT: Just to be absolutely clear, this isn't parliamentary advice. This is IT-nerd advice. RONR doesn't say anything about this, but the collective wisdom of system administrators does. Edited March 30, 2018 at 02:57 AM by Benjamin Geiger Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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