Terminated member wants to come back

[Guest jaco]

We have a terminated member that has resurfaced and wants to come back to our organization.  I have a copy the termination letter and confirmation that the letter was received.  This person was terminated unanimously by the Board of Directors 6 years ago.  The membership Secretary did not know of his past relationship with the organization and accepted his dues payment.  As a board member can I bring this to the attention of the current board? (I was on the board that terminated him also) He wants to be nominated for an office as well...It is my understanding, if I am interpreting Robert's Rule correctly that he is not a member in good standing because his termination has not been rescinded.  Please advise.

[George Mervosh]

If he was accepted again as a member under the procedures your organization follows, he's a member.  No rule in RONR prohibits him from re-applying for membership.

[Guest Guest]

What about running for an office?  And as a board member I feel I am obligated to inform the current board.

[George Mervosh]

What about running for an office?  And as a board member I feel I am obligated to inform the current board.

 

Requirements for holding office are only found in the bylaws, not in RONR.  You can inform anyone you want.  Inside of a meeting you need to be a tad more careful, to ensure you're not attacking a member.

[Guest Guest]

Under the section "Actions that cannot be rescinded or amended" It gets into and expelled member, I was not sure if this situation fell under this rule.

[George Mervosh]

Under the section "Actions that cannot be rescinded or amended" It gets into and expelled member, I was not sure if this situation fell under this rule.

 

Your facts don't indicate anything was rescinded or amended, rather, your facts state he applied anew, like any Joe off the street.   Right?

[Guest Guest]

Correct, He was terminated, our current board is not yet aware of his negative past with our Society I want to bring this to our board to discuss. This situation is not spelled out in our bylaws, I would like to know what our rights are so I can cautiously proceed.

[Weldon Merritt]

Your facts don't indicate anything was rescinded or amended, rather, your facts state he applied anew, like any Joe off the street.   Right?

 

In other words, just because an expulsion cannot be rescinded after the member has been notified, that does not mean that he cannot re-join, provided he meets the current requirements for membership. Any restriction on re-admittance of an expelled member would have to be included in the bylaws. 

[Guest jaco]

Never rescinded, never amended. Really thought once he was terminated from the board and as a general member we would not hear from him again.

[Weldon Merritt]

Really thought once he was terminated from the board and as a general member we would not hear from him again.

 

Apparently you thought wrong.

[Gary Novosielski]

Under the section "Actions that cannot be rescinded or amended" It gets into and expelled member, I was not sure if this situation fell under this rule.

It does fall under the rule in that once someone has been expelled, that action is complete, and can't be changed. Once someone has been expelled, he can't be un-expelled by rescinding the expulsion.

At that point, the only way he can become a member again is to follow the procedure that any new member would follow to join the society. There's no rule against it in RONR.  In fact, there is a rule in favor of it.  (RONR, 11th ed., p. 308, ll. 27-29)

[Shmuel Gerber]

It does fall under the rule in that once someone has been expelled, that action is complete, and can't be changed. Once someone has been expelled, he can't be un-expelled by rescinding the expulsion.

At that point, the only way he can become a member again is to follow the procedure that any new member would follow to join the society. There's no rule against it in RONR.

 

Not only is there no rule against it, but RONR explicitly addresses the situation:

"The only way to reverse an expulsion is to follow whatever procedure is prescribed by the bylaws for admission or reinstatement." (RONR, 11th ed., p. 308, ll. 27-29)

[Gary Novosielski]

Thanks.  Fixed that.

 

The passage does note that there can be distinct procedures prescribed for admission and for reinstatement. 

 

A society could explicitly provide that reinstatement would be more difficult than original admission, or even make it impossible.   But if there were no procedure for reinstatement, I would interpret that language to mean that the procedure for admission would apply as well to readmission.