Executive Session: Pro tem member/ex officio

[Trbedard]

I have been trying to find an answer to this in Roberts rules, but I have yet to find a definitive path to the correct answer. 

I have a Pro tem/ex officio member of my board (he has a voice but no vote outlined in our constitution and bylaws).  He is an extremely combative and intimidating person who often turns the meeting upside down when he is there (he does not attend every meeting, nor is he always present for the entire meeting)  The Board would like to go into executive session to discuss his behavior and all that surrounds that discussion.  Although I do not know the exact numbers, I am confident that a majority of the board members would like to have the session without him in the room.  Can we, through Roberts rules, force him to leave the room during the discussion and invite him back in following its completion?  

[Gary Novosielski]

You can "force" him to obey proper decorum during any meeting, whether in executive session or not.

If I had to guess, I would say it's likely that he is interrupting when others have the floor, not waiting to be recognized, and speaking more than his fair share, and that the chair is lax in enforcing the rules.

In that situation, the chair shares the blame for the situation on a roughly equal basis with the obstreperous member.

As regards executive session, I would say that if the only restricted right is voting, then he has the right to speak and attend executive sessions equally with open sessions.  But your bylaws are open to interpretation by your assembly.

[Trbedard]

Gary, thank you for your feedback.  In most any situation I would agree that he can and should be forced into a situation to "obey".  But his behavior is not much of the interrupting type, he is physically imposing, and he holds sway over the hiring and firing of some on the Board.  Its a sticky situation to say the least that needs to be addressed.  I am certain that each of the board members cannot meet outside the meeting to discuss his behavior, so the idea is to try to make it part of the meeting. 

[Atul Kapur]

Under RONR, a member has the right to attend all meetings of the body, including executive sessions. So that would mean you cannot force him to leave the meeting, except by using disciplinary measures which are complex and found in Chapter XX.

Under RONR, an ex-officio member has all the rights of any other member. Your bylaws, you tell us, remove this member's right to vote; bylaws can do this but you do not tell us if they also remove his right to attend meetings.

A "pro tem/ex-officio" member is an animal with which I am not familiar.

It sounds like you may need extra-parliamentary approaches to deal with this situation where the person in question has hiring/firing authority over some board members.

[Dan Honemann]

"A member of an assembly, in the parliamentary sense, as mentioned above, is a person entitled to full participation in its proceedings, that is, as explained in 3 and 4, the right to attend meetings, to make motions, to speak in debate, and to vote.... Whenever the term member is used in this book, it refers to full participating membership in the assembly unless otherwise specified. Such members are also described as "voting members" when it is necessary to make a distinction." (RONR, 11th ed., p. 3)

"Whenever a meeting is being held in executive session, only members of the body that is meeting, special invitees, and such employees or staff members as the body or its rules may determine to be necessary are allowed to remain in the hall."  (RONR, 11thy ed., p. 95)