Jump to content
The Official RONR Q & A Forums

Over ruling committee action


ward Hildreth

Recommended Posts

The Executive Director of a non-profit organization retired. The Executive Committee of the organization appointed a Search Committee to find a replacement. (The Executive Committee is authorized to conduct all business for the organization between regular meetings). The search committee determined that dual leadership would be more appropriate for the organization. To facilitate this change, the search committee made a motion at an Executive Committee meeting that an existing position be eliminated to free up funding for the second co-leader position. The motion was defeated.

Can the Search Committee take the matter to a called or annual meeting of the organization requesting the organization rescind the action of the Executive Committee? Or can the Search Committee ignore the action of the Executive Committee and make the motion to eliminate the position directly to the organization meeting?

 

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

If the search committee was appointed by the executive committee then it reports to the executive committee and not a membership meeting. So the committee cannot make recommendations to the membership meeting.

An individual member can, at the membership meeting, make the motion to eliminate the position.

By the way, there is no action to rescind because the executive committee defeated the motion. By doing so, they took no action and the status quo was preserved.

You used the word decision as if the board was deciding between two possible options, each of which would constitute an "action" that could be rescinded. They were actually deciding whether to make a change or not. Only making the change would be an "action".

As an analogy, if I am deciding whether to get my sorry self out of bed and I defeat that notion, no action has been taken so there is nothing to rescind.

 

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

1 hour ago, Atul Kapur said:

By the way, there is no action to rescind because the executive committee defeated the motion. By doing so, they took no action and the status quo was preserved.

You used the word decision as if the board was deciding between two possible options, each of which would constitute an "action" that could be rescinded. They were actually deciding whether to make a change or not. Only making the change would be an "action".

As an analogy, if I am deciding whether to get my sorry self out of bed and I defeat that notion, no action has been taken so there is nothing to rescind.

I respectfully disagree. The executive committee did take an "action" when it decided not to do what the motion proposed be done. There is nothing to rescind, however, because nothing having continuing force and effect was created by the adoption of one or more main motions.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

4 hours ago, ward Hildreth said:

The Executive Director of a non-profit organization retired. The Executive Committee of the organization appointed a Search Committee to find a replacement. (The Executive Committee is authorized to conduct all business for the organization between regular meetings). The search committee determined that dual leadership would be more appropriate for the organization. To facilitate this change, the search committee made a motion at an Executive Committee meeting that an existing position be eliminated to free up funding for the second co-leader position. The motion was defeated.

Can the Search Committee take the matter to a called or annual meeting of the organization requesting the organization rescind the action of the Executive Committee? Or can the Search Committee ignore the action of the Executive Committee and make the motion to eliminate the position directly to the organization meeting?

 

 

It seems to me that proposing structural changes to the organization goes beyond the typical charge of a search committee.  Also, I wonder is the Executive Director position described in the bylaws?  If so, any motion to create co-positions would be out of order, as it conflicts with the bylaws.  Of course there could be a motion to amend the bylaws, but that typically has its own specialized rules for proposing and adopting amendments, and a general statement that the EC can carry on business between meetings is not enough to grant it the power to change the bylaws.  

Fortunately, the motion was defeated, but it should never have been put to a vote to begin with.  

I think it would be difficult to find any of the members here who would recommend co-anything positions for any office.  I would certainly advise strongly against the idea.

Edited by Gary Novosielski
Link to comment
Share on other sites

 

Point well taken on rescind. Reconsider seems to be the best approach but the I read in Robert's , page 76, line 14 " It is the only one of the four motions in this class that can be applied to anything except a main question." That seems to contradict the statement in lines 3 and 4 above that indicate it can apply to a vote that was either affirmative or negative.What am I missing?

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

 

 

16 minutes ago, ward Hildreth said:

Point well taken on rescind. Reconsider seems to be the best approach but the I read in Robert's , page 76, line 14 " It is the only one of the four motions in this class that can be applied to anything except a main question." That seems to contradict the statement in lines 3 and 4 above that indicate it can apply to a vote that was either affirmative or negative.What am I missing?

The right book, maybe? Nothing on page 76 of RONR, 11th ed., says anything of the sort.

The closest thing I can find to what you have quoted is this sentence relating to the motion to Reconsider which is found on page 78, lines 30-33, but it is substantially different from the one that you quoted:

"It is the only one of the four motions in this class that can be applied to a secondary motion alone—that is, without also being applied to a related main motion."

Link to comment
Share on other sites

55 minutes ago, ward Hildreth said:

Point well taken on rescind. Reconsider seems to be the best approach

I don't think that, based on what you told us originally, you need to Reconsider (or Rescind). You said that the motion was defeated by the Executive Committee.

So
- Any member of the Executive Committee can make that same motion at the next meeting of the Executive Committee. This is called Renewal of the motion. (RONR 11th ed., pages 336-342) and is allowed because the next meeting of the Executive Committee is a different session.
OR
- Any member of the organization can make that same motion at a membership meeting.

At that membership meeting, it can be raised in debate that the Executive Committee considered and defeated this motion, and the reasons why, but the membership meeting does not need to rescind or reconsider anything done to this motion at Executive Committee.

I make no statement on whether this motion is a good or bad idea, just on the process.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

Loading...
×
×
  • Create New...