Resignation of President and Vice President

[Heather S]

Five of seven 2017 Board members resigned, including the President and Vice President.  in our club by-laws, the immediate past president serves as a non-voting member for a year.

Does the President who resigned now be known as the immediate past president?  Does she get to assume this role as she did not complete her term?  and what happens to the immediate past president who completed her term in 2016?  Do we have two(2) immediate past presidents? 

thank you very much.

 

 

[Hieu H. Huynh]

Ultimately it is up to your organization to interpret your bylaws. Perhaps the bylaws could be amended to address this issue.

[jstackpo]

And the best way to amend them would be to simply eliminate the position of Immediate Past President altogether.

Here's some reasons why:

 IPP is a Bad Idea:

And here's some reasons why the position is a bad idea:

In my personal view, setting up an "official" Immediate Past President (IPP) position is not a particularly good idea.  The most telling argument is the real possibility of a close and bitter race for the presidency, with the current president running (for a second term) against an "outsider".  And the outsider - the "reform candidate", perhaps - wins but is still stuck with the thorn of the IPP on the Board in a position to snipe at the new president.  And perhaps attempt to undermine the new president's plans.  Not to mention vote against them.

If the erstwhile president is a "good guy" the new president can (usually, depending on the bylaws) appoint him to a pre-existing committee - or even have him chair one, which might put him on the Board - as the new president sees fit.  That way the IPP's experience and value can be put to good use, when needed, without the danger of setting up an adversarial situation which would require a bylaw amendment to get out of.

Here's some more reasons

1) The President resigns and wants nothing to do with the organization.
 
2) The President simply doesn't run for election again because he's had enough, and never shows up at a board meeting.
 
3) The President is booted out of office for being incompetent, or for something more nefarious.
 
4) The President dies.
 
5) The President resigns and moves (wants to help but isn't around).

6) Even worse is the bylaw assignment of the IPP to chair a committee - such as nominating.  Then he dies/quits/leaves town, &c.  You are then stuck with an unfillable (by definition) vacancy.

Note that except for item 4, the IPP may well be part of the quorum requirement for meetings, even though he never shows up.

 

Our suggestion is to amend your bylaws to eliminate the position.

[J. J.]

7 hours ago, Heather S said:

Five of seven 2017 Board members resigned, including the President and Vice President.  in our club by-laws, the immediate past president serves as a non-voting member for a year.

Does the President who resigned now be known as the immediate past president?  Does she get to assume this role as she did not complete her term?  and what happens to the immediate past president who completed her term in 2016?  Do we have two(2) immediate past presidents? 

thank you very much.

 

 

Unless your rules say differently, the immediate past president is the one that held the president immediately before the current president.  That  could be the former president who is former because he just died, was expelled from office or resigned, or doesn't want serve at all in the organization.  That is due more to the definition of "immediate" in English than anything else.

I agree with "jstackpo" that it is a bad idea to use an immediate past president, unless the position is better defined. 

[Richard Brown]

I suppose your organization can interpret its bylaws any way it wants to, but the immediate past president is the person who most recently served as president, whether for two terms, one term, one month or one day. The reason for leaving office doesn't matter. The person who was previously the immediate past president ceases to be the immediate past president the instant a current president leaves office, regardless of the reason. 

In my opinion, that is the ONLY reasonable interpretation absent some compelling evidence to the contrary.

Edited to add: If your organization wants the term IPP to apply only to someone who served a full term as president, it should amend it's bylaws to say so.

But that generates other problems. What about the situation where a president resigns part way into his term and the vice president assumes the presidency and serves the remainder of the term.  With that definition, you have a situation where neither of your two most recent presidents qualify as the IPP.

Edited September 28, 2017 at 02:32 PM by Richard Brown
Added last two paragraphs

[Gary Novosielski]

17 hours ago, Heather S said:

Five of seven 2017 Board members resigned, including the President and Vice President.  in our club by-laws, the immediate past president serves as a non-voting member for a year.

Does the President who resigned now be known as the immediate past president?  Does she get to assume this role as she did not complete her term?  and what happens to the immediate past president who completed her term in 2016?  Do we have two(2) immediate past presidents? 

You can have two past presidents, but only one will be the Immediate Past President.

Here's another question for you:  Who resigned first, the President or the Vice President?  If it was the President, then the Vice President immediately became President, if only for a moment, before resigning.  So the Immediate Past President in that case would be the recent Vice President.

You can begin to see why this position is usually more trouble than it is worth.