Chair

[Joann]

I am new to this and our fundraising committee is arguing who chair is if director/chair is at meeting and also if a member of committee quits angry and than the committee would like to invite her to attend another meeting who has the right to invite her. 

[Richard Brown]

How and by whom or by what group  are the members of the committee selected in the first place?

Edited to add: Also, what, if anything,  do your bylaws say about resignations? Are they effective when submitted? How did this member resign from the committee? In person at a meeting? By letter?

Edited October 11, 2022 at 03:14 AM by Richard Brown
Added last paragraph

[Richard Brown]

What is the nature of the argument about who the chair of the committee is? Is it in dispute? What is the nature of the dispute?

[Joann]

The member is selected in by the directors. She resigned by text and resignation in our bylaws are effectives when given. The nature of the argument is committee head is chair at meeting and decides wether they can invite anyone to the meetings.  Even if they resigned on the spot. In this case the directors decided she was not welcome due to the messages she was saying in negativity to the not for profit. 

[Alicia Percell, PRP]

One of your questions was, "who chair is if director/chair is at meeting?"  You leave us to read between the lines when you use the same word "chair" to apparently refer to two different positions.  Did you mean to ask, "Who chairs the committee meeting if the organization's director/chair is also present?"

Presuming that is what you're asking:  Unless your bylaws have some special provision about who serves as committee chairs, the way it works under Robert's Rules is that committees have their own chairs, and it doesn't have to be the same as the organization's chair.  The organization's chair would only chair the committee meeting if the organization's chair were also chosen to be committee chair.

RONR 13:17-18 explains how committee chairs are designated.  In general, whichever person/group appoints the committee also designates who will be committee chair.  Since you said the committee members are appointed by the directors, I'll quote for you the rule from RONR 13:18 about that scenario:

"If the committee is named by a power other than the chair (such as the assembly or the executive board), the body that elects the committee members has the power, at the time the appointments are made, to designate any one of them as chairman.  If a chairman is not designated when the committee is appointed, the committee has the right to elect its own chairman.  In the latter case, the first-named member has the duty of calling the committee together and of acting as temporary chairman until the committee elects a chairman."

So if your bylaws don't say otherwise, and the board when it named the members to the committee did not specify which of those committee members would chair the committee, then the committee members can elect their own committee chair, and the person chosen by the committee would chair the committee meetings whether or not the organization's chair is present.

 

[Atul Kapur]

On 10/11/2022 at 1:05 AM, Joann said:

The nature of the argument is committee head is chair at meeting and decides wether they can invite anyone to the meetings.

Where does the committee chair get the idea that they can unilaterally decide who can attend a committee meeting? Ask them where they find that in RONR.  [spoiler: it isn't there]

 

[Joann]

Thank you I looked through the RONR and could not find that. They insisted it was. Thanks 

[Atul Kapur]

On 10/11/2022 at 1:40 AM, Joann said:

I looked through the RONR and could not find that. They insisted it was.

Have them show you exactly where it is.

[Richard Brown]

Joann, i’m still not clear as to what the dispute is regarding who is chair of the committee so I am not commenting on that aspect of your question. Unless you have rules to the contrary, the committee chair is the head of the committee. I do not understand why you seem to be referring to a committee head who is separate from the committee chair.

However, as to weather whether the former member can be re-appointed to the committee or invited to attend committee meetings as a guest, I agree with Ms. Percell and Dr. Kapur.

Per rules in RONR, the committee chairman chairs the committee meetings. The committee chairman alone does not have the right to decide who can attend committee meetings as a guest. The committee itself has that power by majority vote if there’s any dispute about it. Anyone who attends as a guest is simply a guest and does not have the right to vote but may speak with the consent of the committee.

The person or a body (such as the Board of Directors or the president of the organization) that appointed the members to the committee in the first place has the power to appoint replacements. That person or body, not the committee chairman and not the committee members, has the power to fill vacancies on the committee and to determine whether to re-appoint this person as a member of the committee.*

Those are the rules in RONR. If your organization has rules to the contrary, your own rules will prevail.

*Edited to add:  See section 13:23 of RONR (12th ed.) regarding filling vacancies on a committee.  Also, custom ("That's the way we've always done it") falls to the ground if a point of order is made that it conflicts with a written rule in your own rules or in your parliamentary authority such as RONR.

Edited October 11, 2022 at 02:18 PM by Richard Brown
Added last paragraph and made spelling correction caused by voioce to text error

[Gary Novosielski]

On 10/11/2022 at 1:40 AM, Joann said:

Thank you I looked through the RONR and could not find that. They insisted it was. Thanks 

Oh, it definitely is not in there.  Who decides whether to invite people to a meeting?  According to RONR, it's the committee itself by a majority vote, not the committee chair, or some ex-officio director.