Electronic Meeting - Special Rule

[Guest Susan]

I belong to an organization where some members have two votes and others have one vote (and no, that won't be changed in the foreseeable future).

At in-person meetings, this works fine (those members with two votes receive two voting cards), but for online meetings, it's not so simple, since we have to verify the votes afterwards, based on who voted for and against a motion, and how many votes each member has.

This could become especially problematic when the question is called, since the process to determine the actual vote count (assuming it was close) would probably take more time than just allowing debate to wind up naturally.

Could we put forward a rule of order of some sort for approval by the membership that would allow procedural motions to be decided by a one-vote, one-member process (making the results of such votes instantaneous), or would we need to amend our bylaws to allow for that?

[Gary Novosielski]

Presuming that this one-vote-two-vote business is in your bylaws, then a special rule of order may not conflict with it, no matter how large the vote or how inconvenient the provision.

 

[Guest Susan]

Yes, the one-vote, two-vote business is indeed in our bylaws, so we'll need a bylaw amendment. Good to know.

Thank you.