accepting motions

[Guest Lillian D'Agostaro]

is the president required to accept a motion that will have known detrimental effects to the organization?

[Chris Harrison]

The President is obligated to state and put the question on a motion unless he or she can come up with a legitimate reason to rule it out of order (that the President thinks it will have detrimental effects on the organization wouldn't be a legitimate reason under RONR).

[Guest Guest]

i am the president of a school based 501c3 (that raises under $25,000/year) than runs by roberts rules of order.....a committee chair has indicated that it is her intent to fill the room with people to vote that 50% of the budget should be moved to a one time 2 hour event....this will have devestating affects on other obligations of the organization as well as the future health of the organization...additionally, there is an existing budget that was voted into use for this school year....it was voted in last june....what can i do to maintain the integrity of the organization

[Trina]

Why would all these fill-the-room people have a right to vote? Are they members of the organization?

[Guest Guest]

yes, as per our bylaws every parent is a member.......normally our meetings have anywhere from 30 to 40 people in attendance with a good mix across the 3 grades that our organization services.........but if she brings in 30 to 40 people as she is indicating, the vote can easily go the way they want it to.........do i have any recourse?

[Trina]

1) Recruit some extra people to show up and vote the other way.

2) Argue persuasively against the (in your view irresponsible) modification to the budget.

3) Keep in mind that a motion to amend something previously adopted (the budget, in this case) has a higher vote threshold than a plain vanilla motion -- to pass, it needs two-thirds vote without notice OR majority vote with notice OR majority vote of the entire membership. If no formal notice has been given, then 30 or 40 extra people would not be enough to outvote the 30 or 40 regular attendees (that's assuming that most of the regular attendees will not vote in favor of the spending spree).

4) Any legal obligations (contracts, that sort of thing) that may have been entered into as a result of the currently adopted budget cannot be undone by simply voting to change the budget.

[Guest Edgar]

is the president required to accept a motion that will have known detrimental effects to the organization?

The good citizens of Greece and France just voted in ways that may prove to be detrimental to their countries. That's democracy for ya.

[Gary Novosielski]

The good citizens of Greece and France just voted in ways that may prove to be detrimental to their countries. That's democracy for ya.

On the other hand, after years of failed "austerity" measures, the voters may have recalled the old maxim that if you owe the bank 130 thousand dollars and don't pay it back, you are in big trouble; but if you owe the bank 130 billion dollars and don't pay it back, the bank is in big trouble.

[Guest Edgar]

On the other hand, after years of failed "austerity" measures, the voters may have recalled the old maxim that if you owe the bank 130 thousand dollars and don't pay it back, you are in big trouble; but if you owe the bank 130 billion dollars and don't pay it back, the bank is in big trouble.

Though the situation becomes a bit stickier when "the bank" is your children and grandchildren. So, yes, the bank is in big trouble.