Nominations from the floor required?

[John A]

We have several thousand members in our professional organization and the membership's annual business meeting is only once per year, usually in July or August. The Board meets right after the business meeting and in Nov or Dec. The bylaws allow for a Board that has elected officers, elected directors, and regional directors (elected by regional chapters in accord with their own rules). For the elected directors, the bylaws specify that a nominating committee puts forward some names and that list is sent to the membership ahead of the election, with a call for nominations by petition. This happens in the spring, and the election (electronic ballot sent to entire membership, plurality wins) is held before the annual meeting so that new directors and officers can be announced at the annual business meeting. The elected office actually starts Jan 1 of the year after the election and the nominating committee is elected by the members.

The annual business meeting usually has less than 10% of the membership attending (electronic ballot gets about 30% response), which is why the bylaws specify that member voting is not carried out at the business meeting. Other than the nominations, I think the election process is OK

The question I have is about nominations from the floor (we don't have them). For the officers (secretary, treasurer, president-elect), the nominating committee usually provides 2 names, but the process does not seem to allow (not sure if it ever did) nominations from the membership (by petition or from the floor). Here is the specific wording (we use RONR 11th ed as parliamentary authority).

The Nominating Committee, with concurrence of the Board, shall make nominations for President-Elect, Secretary, and Treasurer. Nominees must be current or previous Board members in good standing and they must give their consent. There shall be at least two nominees for President-Elect. Biographical information for all nominees will be attached to the ballot. The balloting procedure shall be as for Board Members-at-Large.

The possible issues I see with this are as follows.

• The equivalent section for Board Members-at-Large (the elected directors) specifically allows for nomination by petition, but this one does not allow membership to have input (other than by their elected choice for the nominating committee).
• The officer nominations are presented to the Board for their concurrence. While it has never happened, I'm not sure what would happen if the Board did not concur and I don't think that the board needs to concur since the members are the ones electing the officers. The nominations should probably be presented to the members instead (the nominations for elected directors are not presented to the Board).
• The ballots do allow for write-ins, but I don't think that should substitute for nominations from the floor. RONR does not discuss (from what I can see) the possibility of not having nominations from the floor, so I think that means that nominations from the floor should be the norm.

The annual business meeting usually has less than 10% of the membership attending (electronic ballot gets about 30% response), and usually just has officer reports, and comments from the floor regarding bylaws amendments (votes for those are right after the business meeting). Other than the nominations, I think the election process is OK. I would be more comfortable if the officer nominations were presented to the members (like for elected directors) and then allow for nominations by petition. Another option would be to have the election after the annual business meeting. This would allow for nominations from the floor for all elected positions, which would be nice (in my opinion).

Am I interpreting the issues reasonably?

[Joshua Katz]

5 minutes ago, John A said:

• The equivalent section for Board Members-at-Large (the elected directors) specifically allows for nomination by petition, but this one does not allow membership to have input (other than by their elected choice for the nominating committee).
•  

This seems true enough, from what you've told us.

6 minutes ago, John A said:

•  The officer nominations are presented to the Board for their concurrence. While it has never happened, I'm not sure what would happen if the Board did not concur and I don't think that the board needs to concur since the members are the ones electing the officers. The nominations should probably be presented to the members instead (the nominations for elected directors are not presented to the Board).
•  

I agree that the text we've seen does not say what happens if the board fails to concur. I guess the Nominating Committee will need to try again. I'm sure you see why this can be problematic, though. I see no reason for the Board to check the Nominating Committee's work, and if I were a member, I'd support an amendment.

7 minutes ago, John A said:

•  The ballots do allow for write-ins, but I don't think that should substitute for nominations from the floor. RONR does not discuss (from what I can see) the possibility of not having nominations from the floor, so I think that means that nominations from the floor should be the norm.

 

Well, it's the norm unless your bylaws say otherwise. It's a matter of bylaw interpretation whether your bylaws do say otherwise. The real problem, though, is you don't have a floor. You have an electronic election process, to which RONR says (in a footnote), good luck - i.e. if you choose to have such a process, you'll need to create your own rules for it. What is clear, though, is that there's simply no moment when you could have floor nominations - by the time you hold your meeting, the election is over. Nor should you consider a process whereby those who attend vote at the meeting while those who do not vote electronically - RONR specifically cautions against this, and you've identified one reason why: if you did, you'd allow nominations from the floor, and the people voting at the meeting would have different candidates than those voting electronically.

[Richard Brown]

15 hours ago, John A said:

The question I have is about nominations from the floor (we don't have them). For the officers (secretary, treasurer, president-elect), the nominating committee usually provides 2 names, but the process does not seem to allow (not sure if it ever did) nominations from the membership (by petition or from the floor). 

What exactly are you asking us? Whether animations nominations from the floor must be permitted? If that's your question, then I agree with Mr. Katz that your rules, which would trump RONR, do not seem to provide for additional nominations from the floor or by petition or by any other means for officers. It may well require a bylaw amendment to provide for some means of making additional nominations.

I also share the concern of Mr. Katz that the rules you posted might indeed permit the board to reject nominees from the nominating committee. That provision could use some clarification.

Edited May 3, 2019 at 01:34 PM by Richard Brown
Made voice to text correction as indicated

[Guest Zev]

Nomination from the floor has one side effect that I consider to be highly beneficial, in that it has a moderating effect on the election process. Whenever nominations are limited to those nominated by the nominating committee it happens, much too frequently for my taste, that a clique will unduly influence or in some cases capture the nominating committee and thereby restrict the assembly's choices to only those that have their own interests at heart. One entire convention split years ago because of this very type of thing. It wasn't pretty. Beware.

[John A]

14 hours ago, Richard Brown said:

What exactly are you asking us? Whether animations nominations from the floor must be permitted? If that's your question, then I agree with Mr. Katz that your rules, which would trump RONR, do not seem to provide for additional nominations from the floor or by petition or by any other means for officers. It may well require a bylaw amendment to provide for some means of making additional nominations.

I fixed up the autocorrect typo. Whether nomination from the floor must be allowed for was definitely part of what I was asking, but I can now see I was not clear about that. In some sections of RONR, it gives examples of common things that can be added using a special rule of order (e.g., consent calendar). What I see from the comments is that it is OK to not have nominations from the floor, provided that it is consistent with our bylaws/rules.

 

11 hours ago, Guest Zev said:

Nomination from the floor has one side effect that I consider to be highly beneficial, in that it has a moderating effect on the election process. Whenever nominations are limited to those nominated by the nominating committee it happens, much too frequently for my taste, that a clique will unduly influence or in some cases capture the nominating committee and thereby restrict the assembly's choices to only those that have their own interests at heart.

That has been brought up in our society at times, and there is an ad hoc committee that is looking at the nomination process itself. I should probably bring my concerns to them so that they can consider it when they discuss the situation and make recommendations back to the board.

Thanks everyone for the comments.

[Josh Martin]

8 minutes ago, John A said:

What I see from the comments is that it is OK to not have nominations from the floor, provided that it is consistent with our bylaws/rules.

Well, generally speaking, RONR does require nominations from the floor after the report of the nominating committee is received. It is certainly correct that the organization’s rules may provide otherwise and take precedence over RONR (as is always the case), but the rules would need to include some provision indicating that nominations from the floor were not permitted in order to prevent them. If the rules were silent concerning nominations from the floor, then they are in order as RONR provides.

In the election procedure you describe, however, there is no time at which nominations from the floor could possibly be made, since the only meeting of the membership happens after the election is over, and it seems reasonable to conclude that if it is not possible to make nominations from the floor, then nominations from the floor are not in order.  

RONR does not require an organization to accept nominations by mail or by petition.

Edited May 3, 2019 at 01:33 PM by Josh Martin