committee alternate

[Guest Loreen]

If a nominating committee member has attended no meetings, can the chair simply replace her with an alternate or do we need the member to resign?

[Chris Harrison]

If your Bylaws provide for alternates on the Nominating Committee then they should also spell out when and how alternates are seated.

[Guest loreen]

None of our documents spell out the procedure.

[Richard Brown]

3 minutes ago, Guest loreen said:

None of our documents spell out the procedure

Then you are not permitted to have alternates. However, depending upon how the nominating committee members were selected, it may be possible to replace one or more of them. How and by whom were the nominating committee members selected in the first place? Were they appointed by the president? Appointed by the board? Elected by the membership?

what do your bylaws say about the method of selecting the members of the nominating committee?

[Gary Novosielski]

2 hours ago, Guest Loreen said:

If a nominating committee member has attended no meetings, can the chair simply replace her with an alternate or do we need the member to resign?

In the typical case, the nominating committee is appointed by and reports to the general membership, not the board, and especially not the president, who, RONR suggests, should have nothing to do with that committee.

So it depends on whether you do things that way, or some other way. The questions asked by Mr. Brown are good ones.

[Guest loreen]

members of the committee including the alternates were elected by the membership

[jstackpo]

Do your bylaws say how long a term the elected members serve on the job?   Please quote the bylaw text exactly, no paraphrases, please.

[Richard Brown]

Guest Loreen, while you are quoting text, please quote verbatim the provision in the bylaws that provides for alternates to the nominating committee.

[Gary Novosielski]

12 hours ago, Guest loreen said:

members of the committee including the alternates were elected by the membership

That's quite common, and the recommendation of RONR.  But the general rule is that the right to remove belongs to those with the right to appoint.  So it's unlikely that the chairman/president would have the authority to remove or replace committee members, unless there's some rule of yours that we don't know about.

The members of the committee by majority vote could adopt a motion requesting the general membership to replace a member.  Or the membership could decide to do so on its own if it got wind of the situation and was concerned enough to take action.

 

 

 

[Richard Brown]

While agreeing with Mr. Novosielski, I’m concerned about the selection of alternates. Does any authority exist for even having alternates on this committee?

Edited to add: has anybody considered simply asking the non-participating member if he will resign from the committee so that a replacement can be selected? 

Edited November 12, 2019 at 02:16 AM by Richard Brown
Added last paragraph