Guest Curious Member Posted December 22, 2011 at 04:15 PM Report Share Posted December 22, 2011 at 04:15 PM Our Constitution says: "Board of Directors: The Board of Directors shall be comprised of the President, Vice President, Secretary and Treasurer who shall be elected for a one (1) year term and three (3) Directors. Two (2) Directors shall be elected for a two (2) year term. The outgoing President shall become the third Director of the Board at the conclusion of his term as President and serve on the Board for one (1) year. If there is not an outgoing President to fulfill the Past President role, this position on the Board will be filled by a nomination, acceptance, and election per Article IV."It later goes on to say "Nominations: Nominations may be made by the Board, or any member in good standing. Nominations may be sent to the Secretary and postmarked no later than December 1st. A signed statement from the proposed candidate must be postmarked no later than December 15th. The nominations shall be posted by December 20th.The questions are as follows:1) Candidate "A" was nominated for "any vacancies that may or may not be open on the Board". Candidate "A's" acceptance letter stated they would accept a one (1) year Board position. Is this a legal nomination and acceptance since the current president will be leaving the position and should automatically take over the only one (1) year Board position?2) Candidate "B" was nominated for Treasurer. Candidate "B" sent in the letter of acceptance for a "2012 Board Position". Is this legal since candidate "B" did not state which position they would run for?3) Candidate "C" was nominated for President. Candidate "C" sent in the letter of acceptance for "any nomination for a 2012 board position". Again, is this legal as the candidate did not state which position they were running for but rather sent in a "blanket" letter of acceptance for any position?4) Candidate "D" was nominated for Vice President. Candidate "D" sent in an acceptance letter stating "... a position on the clubs BOD or Executive Board..." Again, is an open blanket acceptance letter legal and further, our Constitution does not address an "Executive Board". Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rev Ed Posted December 22, 2011 at 04:53 PM Report Share Posted December 22, 2011 at 04:53 PM I don't see any problem here (other then a complicated way of electing one director/Past President which is another thread onto itself.) At the Annual meeting (or the meeting where the election is held) the nominees could be asked for which position they would accept. However, as three of the candidates have been nominated for a specific position, I would assume that each person is running for that position and run the election on that basis. If they want to be elected to another position they can always speak up for themselves or better yeat have someone nominate them for another position. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Edgar Posted December 22, 2011 at 05:03 PM Report Share Posted December 22, 2011 at 05:03 PM The questions are as follows:RONR does not require that nominations be accepted by the nominee so any questions regarding your "letters of acceptance" won't be answered here (at least not authoritatively). As far as RONR is concerned, you can nominate and elect someone who doesn't want the job. His only option is to decline if elected.And I'm afraid you'll have to sort out the rest of your messy bylaws as well. You might want to consider engaging the services of a professional parliamentarian. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rev Ed Posted December 23, 2011 at 12:15 AM Report Share Posted December 23, 2011 at 12:15 AM At the same time a nominee can state during debate that he/she would refuse to accept the position if elected. I have seen this happen before. People are unlikely to vote for a person who has stated that he/she refuses to accept a position. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Trina Posted December 23, 2011 at 12:28 AM Report Share Posted December 23, 2011 at 12:28 AM Our Constitution says: "Board of Directors: The Board of Directors shall be comprised of the President, Vice President, Secretary and Treasurer who shall be elected for a one (1) year term and three (3) Directors. Two (2) Directors shall be elected for a two (2) year term. The outgoing President shall become the third Director of the Board at the conclusion of his term as President and serve on the Board for one (1) year. If there is not an outgoing President to fulfill the Past President role, this position on the Board will be filled by a nomination, acceptance, and election per Article IV."It later goes on to say "Nominations: Nominations may be made by the Board, or any member in good standing. Nominations may be sent to the Secretary and postmarked no later than December 1st. A signed statement from the proposed candidate must be postmarked no later than December 15th. The nominations shall be posted by December 20th.The questions are as follows:1) Candidate "A" was nominated for "any vacancies that may or may not be open on the Board". Candidate "A's" acceptance letter stated they would accept a one (1) year Board position. Is this a legal nomination and acceptance since the current president will be leaving the position and should automatically take over the only one (1) year Board position?...I concur with Edgar that the vagueness of the assorted letters of acceptance doesn't matter (according to RONR).However, whoever actually nominates candidate "A" should really state the nomination with better clarity . Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Josh Martin Posted December 23, 2011 at 01:25 AM Report Share Posted December 23, 2011 at 01:25 AM The questions are as follows:1) Candidate "A" was nominated for "any vacancies that may or may not be open on the Board". Candidate "A's" acceptance letter stated they would accept a one (1) year Board position. Is this a legal nomination and acceptance since the current president will be leaving the position and should automatically take over the only one (1) year Board position?2) Candidate "B" was nominated for Treasurer. Candidate "B" sent in the letter of acceptance for a "2012 Board Position". Is this legal since candidate "B" did not state which position they would run for?3) Candidate "C" was nominated for President. Candidate "C" sent in the letter of acceptance for "any nomination for a 2012 board position". Again, is this legal as the candidate did not state which position they were running for but rather sent in a "blanket" letter of acceptance for any position?4) Candidate "D" was nominated for Vice President. Candidate "D" sent in an acceptance letter stating "... a position on the clubs BOD or Executive Board..." Again, is an open blanket acceptance letter legal and further, our Constitution does not address an "Executive Board". It is ultimately up to your organization to interpret its own Bylaws. See RONR, 11th ed., pgs. 588-591 for some Principles of Interpretation. So far as RONR is concerned, signed statements are not required, so it does not provide much guidance on this issue. RONR does recommend that candidates be contacted to see if they are willing to serve, in order to help prevent an incomplete election. With that in mind, I think it would be wise to at least contact Candidate A to clarify whether he would accept a position with a term of longer than one year. The other candidates are apparently willing to serve in any position on the board, which seems fine to me. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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