Can a membership meeting of over 100 be held online

[Guest jane vincent]

Can a Special membership meeting of an association be called to decide a bylaw change online if the bylaws do not state that electronic voting can be held.  Also how then would a quorum be established?

[Richard Brown]

13 minutes ago, Guest jane vincent said:

Can a Special membership meeting of an association be called to decide a bylaw change online if the bylaws do not state that electronic voting can be held.  Also how then would a quorum be established?

Not unless your bylaws or some superior rule (such as your constitution, articles of incorporation or state law) authorize electronic meetings and absentee (electronic) voting.  It would be up to your organization to set (and interpret) quorum requirements in its own rules.

Edited to add:  RONR contains some very general information and suggestions on electronic meetings on Pages 97-100.

Edited May 7, 2019 at 09:56 PM by Richard Brown
Added last paragraph

[Gary Novosielski]

6 hours ago, Guest jane vincent said:

Can a Special membership meeting of an association be called to decide a bylaw change online if the bylaws do not state that electronic voting can be held.  Also how then would a quorum be established?

No.  If the bylaws are silent on the matter, then meetings and voting require the physical presence of members.

[Rob Elsman]

Even if the bylaws authorize holding special sessions electronically, rules of order that are adapted to the circumstances will need to be adopted.

As I recall, the authors added some sample sets of such rules in the CD version of RONR, 11th edition. It might be worthwhile to take a look there.

[Richard Brown]

1 hour ago, reelsman said:

Even if the bylaws authorize holding special sessions electronically, rules of order that are adapted to the circumstances will need to be adopted.

As I recall, the authors added some sample sets of such rules in the CD version of RONR, 11th edition. It might be worthwhile to take a look there.

Yes, they did.  It's on the CD-ROM version, but it's not as extensive as I would like.  It's a very good start, though!   I've seen other rules for electronic meetings that I like better.

[jstackpo]

1 hour ago, Richard Brown said:

Yes, they did.  It's on the CD-ROM version, but it's not as extensive as I would like.  It's a very good start, though!   I've seen other rules for electronic meetings that I like better.

I dunno if these are the rules you "like better", but I like them (particularly because I wrote them...):

https://www.dropbox.com/s/g8w31eocwqx067h/E-Meetings 2012.docx?dl=0

 

13 hours ago, Guest jane vincent said:

Can a Special membership meeting of an association be called to decide a bylaw change online if the bylaws do not state that electronic voting can be held.  Also how then would a quorum be established?

A 100 member meeting (if you really mean a full deliberative "meeting" on line) would be utterly hopeless to attempt.  Voting, without any opportunities for amendment, would be feasible if the bylaws permitted such.  Not a good idea, however -- all or nothing votes usually end up with nothing.  Or bad compromise choices.

[Richard Brown]

1 hour ago, jstackpo said:

I dunno if these are the rules you "like better", but I like them (particularly because I wrote them...):

https://www.dropbox.com/s/g8w31eocwqx067h/E-Meetings 2012.docx?dl=0

Yes, the suggested rules and procedures in your article are absolutely among those that I like better and are much more comprehensive.  In fact, yours may be the best I have seen.  Thank you for sharing them again!

The national Libertarian Party also has some very good rules and procedures for e-meetings, or, more specifically, for voting on specific motions via email, from the number of co-sponsors needed in order to start an email vote on a motion to the details of how the discussion and voting is to be handled. 

Several years ago NAP published an 81 page booklet on electronic meetings which is very good, but it is no longer in publication.   It was published in 2009 by the Educational Resources Committee with Ann Guiberson as the chairman. I keep  hoping NAP will publish an updated version.