Can chair participate in Discussion

[pippenger]

I hope this question is not a stupid one, I looked to see if it has already been answered and did not find anything listed.  So a county commision meeting an item receved a motion and a second then went to discussion.  During discussion the chairman started talking about the item and a member informed him that as chair, he could not be involved in discussion - the commission is made up of 9 members.  Does the chair have the right to be involved in discussions of motions?  where can I find this information, I've looked ?  Thank you in advance.

[Weldon Merritt]

So far as RONR is concerned, in a small board meeting (defined as one "where there are not more than about a dozen members present"), the chair may participate as fully as any other member. RONR (12th ed.) 49:21. If there are procedural statutes or ordinances applicable to the body. and they provide differently, they would take precedence over RONR. I would be surprised if they were more restrictive than RONR on that issue, but it's possible.

[Gary Novosielski]

On 7/28/2022 at 5:20 PM, pippenger said:

I hope this question is not a stupid one, I looked to see if it has already been answered and did not find anything listed.  So a county commision meeting an item receved a motion and a second then went to discussion.  During discussion the chairman started talking about the item and a member informed him that as chair, he could not be involved in discussion - the commission is made up of 9 members.  Does the chair have the right to be involved in discussions of motions?  where can I find this information, I've looked ?  Thank you in advance.

That's not a rule in RONR, at least not for small boards.  It's very likely that as a county public body there are statutes and regulations involved, but all the ones I've seen have stressed that the chair has full rights to make motions, participate and debate, and vote. 

But you'd still have to check yours to be certain.

[Tomm]

On 7/28/2022 at 3:10 PM, Gary Novosielski said:

That's not a rule in RONR, at least not for small boards.

Is it not true however, that in large assemblies the Chair must step aside from that position to participate in debate?

Do all small boards automatically function under rules for small boards or does that need to be specified in perhaps a special rule of order? 

 

[Rob Elsman]

If a small board uses RONR (12th ed.) as its parliamentary authority, the board has sufficient authority to operate under the "relaxed" rules for small boards without adopting a special rule of order.

[Gary Novosielski]

On 7/28/2022 at 7:28 PM, Tomm said:

Is it not true however, that in large assemblies the Chair must step aside from that position to participate in debate?

Here's the rule for larger assemblies:

Quote

43:29      If the presiding officer is a member of the society, he has— as an individual—the same rights in debate as any other member; but the impartiality required of the chair in an assembly precludes his exercising these rights while he is presiding. Normally, especially in a large body, he should have nothing to say on the merits of pending questions. On certain occasions—which should be extremely rare—the presiding officer may believe that a crucial factor relating to such a question has been overlooked and that his obligation as a member to call attention to the point outweighs his duty to preside at that time. To participate in debate, he must relinquish the chair....

But note the use of the words extremely rare (which are extremely rare within RONR).   A presiding officer who repeatedly relinquishes the chair to the VP or other member, is someone who may not be well suited to the job of presiding.

As you can see, the small-board rules are different, to say the least.

Edited July 29, 2022 at 02:09 AM by Gary Novosielski