Gary Novosielski

Unless your bylaws say otherwise.

If a midterm vacancy occurs in the office of president, whether by resignation, removal, death, or what have you,   The vice president becomes president automatically

Nobody becomes vice president automatically, unless your society has a numbered sequence of vice presidents, in which case the 1st VP becomes president, and all other VP's subtract 1 from the ordinal number of their office, and slide over one chair.

In any case, a vacancy is created in the office of vice president, or the highest numbered vice president in the latter case.

It seems to me that if the removal is overruled or rescinded by a higher authority, everyone who changed office as a result of the removal resumes their previous office.

If anyone was appointed to any resulting vacancy, they're un-appointed.  Of course you might have customized rules on this, which would supersede anything in RONR. Or the Order of Reinstatement might specify how things should get sorted out.

But I see no reason to presume that the effect of such a reinstatement would be any different from what happens if a motion is rescinded or is declared null and void after its apparent passage.

18 hours ago, Kim Goldsworthy said:

It is a MYTH to believe that:

   • A board member loses his right to debate within a meeting of the general membership.

 

Unless of course this belief is based on the fact that the member of the board is not a member of the general membership, which is unusual but not unheard of.

If in fact it was a Parliamentary Inquiry, then yes, the member should have made the nomination anyway.  There is no way to Appeal an inquiry, becsuse an inquiry is not a ruling.  

If the nomination, when actually made, was ruled improper, that would have been the time to lodge an Appeal.  

And if I were a member, and the chair consulted source after source, including the founding documents and The Work itself, and found no evidence of the existence of this magic rule he had made up, yet nevertheless went right ahead and enforced it anyway, I think I'd be drafting a resolution of censure, at a minimum.

On 12/15/2016 at 0:59 PM, Guest Dick Satterly said:

When a motion is made and seconded for the Secretary to cast one vote to elect an unopposed Officer candidate to office, is a vote by the members present required?

The practice you describe is not anything in RONR, and to the best of my knowledge never was.   The chair should rule it out of order.

Whether a vote is required for unopposed candidates is something you will have to consult your bylaws to find out.  If a ballot vote is required in the bylaws, then a ballot vote must be held (with write-in votes allowed) unless the bylaws have an explicit provision for dispensing with a vote in the case of unopposed candidates.

If your bylaws do not require a vote, the chair does not direct the Secretary cast any vote.  The chair simply announces that if there are no further nominations for the office, the sole nominee is elected by acclamation.

8 hours ago, lpc124 said:

We have a wonderful president and vice president serving on our church's board of trustees. The bylaws state that they can hold up to 2 consecutive 1 year terms and they are now both completing the second 1 year term.  (The bylaws allow them to serve again but after a 1 year break.)

The situation is that our minister is taking sabbatical this coming year and the board is in agreement that they would like to have the president and vice president remain in their roles for another 1 year term to provide the necessary stability for a rapidly growing and active congregation. How would we handle this at the January business meeting when we are scheduled to vote to fill these two offices? Would it be acceptable to make a motion to acknowledge where the bylaws stand on these board terms and to make an exception with a clear rationale and time frame that we would not be in accordance with our bylaws?

 

Absolutely not.  Such a motion would be out of order, and would probably create a continuing breach.

The church would have to amend its bylaws, using the method contained in the bylaws for their own amendment, in order to change any term limits contained in the bylaws.  Such rules are not suspendible.

14 hours ago, Guest jhonora said:

Recently, in a meeting where biennial elections were held a member presented a letter from another member who was willing to be nominated but could not be present. The letter was not accepted on the premise that a member has to be present to be nominated. Upon being challenged, the chairman flipped through the local chapter's bylaws, the national bylaws, and then Robert's Rules, but could not find anything to support his decision not to accept it. The chairman refused to accept the letter. Keep in mind, the letter was just intended to document the nominee's consent and willingness to be nominated. At least three members stood ready to actually make the nomination. - The question is: Must a member be present in order to be nominated? 

No, a member need not be present.  The member who was willing to be nominated acted quite properly by supplying the letter.

I'm mildly shocked by the fact that after the chair was completely unable to support his claim after referring to the founding documents, and RONR, nobody apparently thought to Appeal [§24] from the decision of the chair, and put the matter to a vote.  

The chair does not have the powers of a dictator.  Rulings are ultimately decided by the assembly.  

"Find out just what any people will quietly submit to and you have found out the exact measure of injustice and wrong which will be imposed upon them."
--Frederick Douglass

It may not be relevant, but a vote of 14 - 8 does not amount to a 2/3 vote, if that was indeed the requirement.

I'm also of the view that the assembly can't delegate power to do this, if the bylaws are that specific.

But like any motion to do anything, the assembly could refer the matter to a committee for buffing and polishing before acting on, amending, or ignoring its recommendations, which would be in the nature of nominations

9 hours ago, Guest Linda J said:

Let's see if I have this right. We have a list of nominees-one person per position- closed ballot. Let's say 100 people voting-10 people write no confidence across their ballots. No one writes in any other candidates. The teller's report would reflect...for each position...

Number of votes cast...90   Necessary for election...46    So and so received...90     Illegal votes...0

I'd leave off the illegal votes, since there weren't any.  The business about one vote needed to elect is only true in the case that there is but one vote cast (or no votes cast) .  

• If one vote is cast, a majority is one, since one is the smallest integer more than one half of one.  In that case, one vote is needed to elect, and the candidate is elected.  
• If no votes are cast, the smallest integer more than half of zero is still one, so again, one vote is needed to elect, but in this case, a majority was not reached, and so nobody is elected.  

The abstentions are not counted as votes, and don't raise the number needed to elect, but you've clearly got that point right.  

Good luck.

1 hour ago, DebbieinFL said:

Thank you for replying. My latter confusion was two-fold:

• in reference to whether this meeting would fall under the "subsequent meeting" instruction of pp. 501 
• if a meeting is improperly called are the decisions made binding at all

But if it's determined that this is "a dead horse," then I understand and will ask no more. 

I think the meeting would fall under the "subsequent meeting" instructions, but they refer back to the rule that applies to the first meeting, so it appears that two members are sufficient to call a meeting if the chair fails to call one.  Whether the chair "failed" or not is, I think, up to the committee to decide, unless overruled by the parent body.

If a meeting is improperly called, it is not a valid meeting, and nothing done is valid, but the most likely way that would happen in this scenario is if the two people calling the meeting failed to send notice of the meeting to all committee members.

15 minutes ago, Guest Linda J said:

Does this report include the number of yeses or just the statement that the officers and trustees were elected? this was a closed ballot.

There should be no "Yes" or "No"  votes in an election.  If the vote was by ballot, that ballot would contain the names of those nominated, with space for write-in votes.

14 minutes ago, Clurichan said:

Which (in a ballot election) would list illegal ballots cast for "No Confidence"?

I don't believe so.  I would treat them as not indicating a preference, which RONR advises that the tellers should ignore;

Quote

In recording the votes cast, the principle followed is that a choice has no mandate from the voting body unless approval is expressed by more than half of those entitled to vote and registering any evidence of having some preference. Accordingly, the tellers ignore blank ballots and other ballots that indicate no preference, treating them as abstentions.

 

But stay tuned for other opinions.

...and certainly are not a record of what occurred after the meeting.

The votes of individuals are not reflected in the minutes unless the vote was a Roll-Call vote, which would be highly unusual in the case of an election.

In the usual case, where elections are carried out by ballot vote, the votes of members are secret, and could not be included in the minutes because they are unknown.

And in any case, it is not possible to vote for nobody.  The only way to vote against a candidate  is to vote for someone else.  Votes that do not express a preference for any candidate are treated as abstentions, and deemed to acquiesce in the decision reached  by a majority of those voting.

What does go in the minutes is the Teller's Report.

3 hours ago, Godelfan said:

I'm not sure about 3.

It may be a stretch.  What if the chair instructed the secretary to read it?

In any case, I think it's safe to say that if the member wishes to assert her right to participate in debate, the only foolproof way is to show up at meetings.

4 hours ago, Guest Katie said:

Our bylaws simply state that we follow Robert's Rules of Order, so there is no specific bylaw on attendance by phone.  In the past, we have allowed members to call in and participate over speaker phone, but not to vote if not physically present.  Are there specific rules within Robert's Rules on this issue?

Yes.  It's prohibited.   You'd need rules in your bylaws to allow for electronic  "attendance"

On 12/8/2016 at 3:27 PM, Guest Sharon said:

I approached our office manager (we are a small park) with a question of a board member abstaining from voting during a meeting. (the person did not want to be seen as objecting to a family member) The office manages said that abstaining is in fact voting in the positive (or in the yea) for whatever the vote was. Is this in fact true????

No, that's nonsense.   When you abstain, voting is what you're abstaining from.  You have no effect on the outcome, one way or the other.  

16 hours ago, Dave123 said:

Can a married couple serve as President & Fire Chief of a volunteer fire department? Would this pose some sort of conflict of interest and is there anything to warrant against it? 

There's no rule against it in RONR.  But of course if it makes members uncomfortable they can easily avoid the problem by electing only one (or neither) of them.

On 12/8/2016 at 0:33 AM, Guest Ronnieadair@cox.net said:

If an officer announces that they will not be running again, a new person is running unapossed for that office.  The secret vote is conducted and 109 eligible voters vote and 51 people write in the retiring officer, 49 vote for the new nominee and the balance of the votes goes to others.   The retiring officer clearly again states they will not accept the position.   In this case would not the new nominee be the new board member?

The retiring officer need not have bothered to clearly state anything, since he was not elected.  None of the candidates received a majority, so you need to hold a second and possibly subsequent ballots until someone is elected.   If the person elected declines, you keep on voting. 

17 hours ago, ARYOUNG said:

What if the only time the county commission chairman is supposed to vote is to break a tie, but chooses to abstain because he needs more "verbiage"?

If the chair may vote only in the event of a tie (which is not the rule in RONR, by the way), yet chooses to abstain instead, that's fine.  

However, a tie vote simply defeats the motion then and there.  It does not hang around in limbo waiting for "verbiage" to emerge.  So the chair, either by voting No or by abstaining, has effectively decided to defeat the motion.

And no, you can't censure someone for exercising a basic right.  At least not if you expect to be taken seriously.

7 hours ago, Guest Tim Schieck said:

Recently at a meeting, our organization took a vote by ballot. Because of time constraints, the Chairman said the results would be announced at a later date. Written communication was sent to the members informing them of the results the day after. And now there is debate how it should be recorded in the minutes. One person is arguing that the results should be retroactively recorded in the minutes before the secretary submits them. Is this the proper way to handle this situation?

No.  The minutes should reflect only what was actually done at that meeting prior to adjournment.  

Written communication to the members is fine, but it does not replace the requirement that the tellers report must be read, and repeated by the chair, and the result announced by the chair at a properly called meeting.  I concur with Mr. H.

5 hours ago, 1stChurch said:

I have encountered several times among church folk the notion that the society can vote to suspend the bylaws in their entirety, do what they need to do, then vote to reinstate them. Perhaps this is what the OP had in mind.

"No" seems to cover it.  :-)

 

A quaint notion, but No does cover it.

4 hours ago, Dave Bennett said:

If the society has adopted RONR (11th ed.) as its parliamentary authority, I don't think a standing rule would be applicable, especially as it relates to a majority vote with previous notice.  RONR (11th ed.) p. 18, ll. 16-19 states "A standing rule can be adopted by a majority vote without previous notice, provided that it does not conflict with or amend any existing rule or act of the society."  I would think RONR would be considered a rule of the society.

That's true, but there is no rule in RONR prohibiting non-members from attending a meeting.  It says that they have no right to attend, but the decision of who may and who may not attend is left up to the assembly.

There is a rule preventing them from speaking in debate, and that rule could not be superseded by a standing rule, but it could be suspended by a 2/3 vote, and it could be superseded by a special rule of order.

I was about to feel his forehead.

2 hours ago, ssj1203 said:

In order to get an issue on the Agenda by the membership at a regularly scheduled meeting, is there a need for a 10 day advance notice?  If not, what amount of time is required.

There is no advance notice requirement in RONR for getting anything on the agenda.

But then again, there is no requirement in RONR for even having an agenda in the first place--especially for regularly scheduled meetings with a frequency of at least quarterly, where the Standard Order of Business in RONR is almost always sufficient.

You may have special rules on this in your organization, of which we would have no knowledge

Ultimately, the way this (and similar matters of bylaws interpretation) are decided is that someone who believes (or maintains, arguendo) that the person is not rightly a member raises a Point of Order that the membership should not be considered as valid.  The chair rules on the matter, subject to Appeal, in which case the matter is settled by a vote of the assembly.  The chair may also place the matter directly before the assembly for a decision.