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Correcting a Chairman


Guest Jeanne

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At a recent Special Meeting of our church, the Chairman laid ground rules before we could begin. Her "ground rules" started out with the statement that "no one can raise a Point of Order with out stating where it was located in Roberts Rules of Order. She went on to say that if someone did raise a Point of Order, she had the final say on it as well as on any "issues" raised during the meeting. Because I did not know in advance of her ground rules that she planned to reveal, I did not have my copy of Roberts Rules with me to meet her requirement of giving the page numbers. To validate her position she said she had gone on line and had found experts who said the Chairman has the final word. Their names or views were not read....only referred too. My feeling was she was validating herself by making them her authority. She said she had gone on line because there are so many grey areas in Roberts Rules and she felt few of us understood them clearly.....thus the need for her explaining the ground rules to us.

The next day I wrote a letter to the Board of Trustees and enclosed a copy the pages of Roberts Rules of Order 11th Revised Edition (which our bylaws require to be used) showing that the chairman was wrong because the chairs finding regarding Point of Order, can be appealed, if seconded and goes to the membership for final vote. Instead of a thank you for the correction, the Board sent a letter back saying "the Chairman had spent alot of time researching the matter and contacted experts and agreed with her interruptation of the rule on that basis.

What is my next step? Am I being forced to send the pages to the memberships so that we are not robbed of our right to appeal in the future?

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I have been to many meetings in many organizations with people that think they know what is in RONR and many of them are just plain wrong. While it may be a little over the top, I don't think it is necessarily a bad thing that people who raise a Point of Order know what the rules actually say. I think I have a little more knowledge than the layperson and my questions/comments in this forum should make it clear that I don't know enough to address some rules without consulting RONR first. And that should be the first scary thing about the Chair getting advice from online. For every David Foulkes above there is someone like me that knows just enough to be dangerous and THINK I'm right. :blink:

As for the appeal, have your RONR 11th ed. handy and if she makes a ruling you do not like, Appeal and show the Chair and members the appropriate pages according to her rules. If you feel the assembly agrees with you and the Chair doesn't, then one option may be to contact NAP and see if a Registered Parliamentarian (since it is apparently all about Appeal to Authority) can address the BoT on the issue. Maybe a simple letter would suffice. Or you could also move to invite a Parliamentarian and the Board of Trustees to the next meeting to discuss how Points of Order and Appeals work - paid for by the organization of course.

Last resort is of course Chapter XX.

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Maybe find out how to get the chairman's ground rules thrown out. Look at Official Interpretation 2006-2 SUSPEND THE RULES TO REMOVE PRESIDENT (at www.robertsrules.com/interp_list.html#2006_2). I'll see if I can find the Oklahoma Script for you, or maybe Chris or someone will amble along and drop it in.

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Act I

In Oklahoma territory in 1906, cowboy Curly McLain looks forward to the beautiful day ahead as he wanders into farm girl Laurey Williams's yard ("Oh, What a Beautiful Mornin'"). He and Laurey tease each other, while Laurey's Aunt Eller looks on. There will be a box social dance that night, which includes an auction of lunch baskets prepared by the local girls to raise funds for a schoolhouse.

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What is my next step? Am I being forced to send the pages to the memberships so that we are not robbed of our right to appeal in the future?

That's an excellent idea. But don't be surprised if the general reaction is similar to that of the Trustees. And then you'll know what an uphill battle an appeal will be, given the circumstances.

On the bright side, I suggest your church have a nice study of Jer 5:21 at the next service.

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Have you determined whether or not this script correctly follows the procedure outlined in the 11th edition?

I just re-read Section 62 and Rod's script, and I don't see anything wrong with the script, except that Rod seems not to have updated the page numbers. Am I missing something? (Got to write him about it.)

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I just re-read Section 62 and Rod's script, and I don't see anything wrong with the script, except that Rod seems not to have updated the page numbers. Am I missing something? (Got to write him about it.)

I asked if the script correctly follows the procedure outlined in the 11th edition because I was unable to check it for myslef. Going to www.parlipro.org/pdf/suspendrules.pdf doesn't seem to get me there.

I'm glad to hear that it does. :)

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I asked if the script correctly follows the procedure outlined in the 11th edition because I was unable to check it for myslef. Going to www.parlipro.org/pdf/suspendrules.pdf doesn't seem to get me there.

I'm glad to hear that it does. :)

I said "Wups" because it hadn't occurred to me to check.

I jsut checked, and the link works for me. Are you trying to plug your toaster into the Internet again?

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Going to www.parlipro.org/pdf/suspendrules.pdf doesn't seem to get me there.

This link should work: http://www.parlipro....uspendrules.pdf

In this instance you're not really "going to" a web page, you're opening a PDF file. And while most browsers (I use Google's "Chrome") will open PDF files in the browser, there may be some (I'm not sure of this) that would require an "external" program (such as Adobe Reader).

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This link should work: http://www.parlipro....uspendrules.pdf

In this instance you're not really "going to" a web page, you're opening a PDF file. And while most browsers (I use Google's "Chrome") will open PDF files in the browser, there may be some (I'm not sure of this) that would require an "external" program (such as Adobe Reader).

Oh, now Mr Honemann understands. He did plug his toaster into the Internet again.

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