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Election


Nan_P2950

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At every conference, an election is held. There are qualifications that need to be met, as per bylaws, to be an elected Board member (for president, v-president, secretary, and treasurer)....

They are concerned that all four will not be filled, as most don't meet the qualifications... Since these qualifications are listed in the bylaws, can't be suspended...

What would be the next step, or how should this be handled?

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First check the bylaws.  Officers (current ones) may be in office "until the election of their successors" - if no election, they STAY in (at least until they quit or you finally do complete the election).

Or....

Announce that because of a lack of leadership interest, the organization will dissolve itself and go out of business.  Really.  Organizations don't last forever, and it is much better to close up shop formally than just drift along, and then wonder what happened to the bank account, far too long after the fact to do anything about it.

Often enough a threat like this one will shake some people out of the woodwork who will be willing to serve after all.  But if it doesn't, there is a message there...


You might also consider WHY no one wants to be president. Perhaps you're asking too much of that position. Perhaps the past presidents have made the job appear more difficult than it has to be. Perhaps the members are making it harder on the president than they should.

Perhaps the board should be doing more. After all, the only essential role of the president is to preside at meetings. Some or all administrative responsibilities could be delegated to, or distributed among, the board members.
 

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There is one who is very interested for president... it's a matter of filling the rest of the board...

 

Do you even need a board?

 

And the same person can serve as both secretary and treasurer.

 

So that leaves someone to serve as vice-president. A job a chimpanzee can do. Usually.

 

In any event, there's nothing in RONR that will help you fill offices no one wants to occupy.

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Are your eligibility requirements too restrictive? Amend the bylaws.

Their qualifications:

"2.2.3 - Have attended two full (name of organization) delegate meetings and two years of committee experiences; " (they interpret this as either/or)... my interpretation is, has to have both...

"4.3 - The Executive Board of the Alliance shall be no more than two (2) officer from the same chapter." ( There can only be a maximum of two from the same chapter to be on their Board for this organization)

To amend their bylaws, as stated "Motions or amendments must be submitted to the Vice Pesident by postage mail or electronic mail (E-mail) 120 days prior to the conference." So any submissions to amendment(s) to their bylaws today will be held (and voted) to the next convention...

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Their qualifications:

"2.2.3 - Have attended two full (name of organization) delegate meetings and two years of committee experiences; " (they interpret this as either/or)... my interpretation is, has to have both...

"4.3 - The Executive Board of the Alliance shall be no more than two (2) officer from the same chapter." ( There can only be a maximum of two from the same chapter to be on their Board for this organization)

To amend their bylaws, as stated "Motions or amendments must be submitted to the Vice Pesident by postage mail or electronic mail (E-mail) 120 days prior to the conference." So any submissions to amendment(s) to their bylaws today will be held (and voted) to the next convention...

Apparently, one or both of these requirements is causing the society to be unable to fill its officer positions. The bylaws should be amended as soon as possible to fix this problem.

In the meantime, fill as many of the positions as you can, and I suppose the rest will be vacant until the next convention. You say that a President is probably going to be elected, so that's good. A Secretary Pro Tempore will need to be elected at each meeting until the position is filled permanently. I would also note that, unless your bylaws provide otherwise, someone can serve in more than one position, although the "two per club" rule would seem to prevent someone from serving in more than two positions.

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I had always thought that the two minimum required officers would be the president/chair and the secretary...

The two minimum officers for an assembly are a presiding officer and a secretary, but if the positions of President and Secretary are vacant, a Chairman Pro Tempore and Secretary Pro Tempore can be elected at each meeting in the interim.

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I had always thought that the two minimum required officers would be the president/chair and the secretary...

 

The two minimum officers for an assembly are a presiding officer and a secretary, but if the positions of President and Secretary are vacant, a Chairman Pro Tempore and Secretary Pro Tempore can be elected at each meeting in the interim.

 

Yes:  that's a practical question -- it says who you need there, minimum, to get the meeting run:  "president/chair" indeed means chair, the person who presides at the meetng, NOT at all necessarily the person who is your annual poo-bah.  And the secretary is, similarly, not whoever you have elected to fill that board position this year, but the boots-on-the-ground (ghod, what a brilliantly evocative expression, Republicans are so useful someitmes) person in the room who keeps track of stuff.  This is not just for posterity; not just so that the next meeting knows what might be carried over, that it has to deal with; but for immediate reference, like if, such as in this case, there's a motion to postpone, and it fails, then the presiding officer needs to tell the assembly what the immediately pending question has reverted to, and he might not remember it verbatim, so he must turn to the secretary (e.g., "the motion to postpone has been lost; the secretary will now please re-read to the assembly the motion that is now pending, about buying giant plastic balls" or whatever).

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