lack of volunteers for board election

[Guest guest]

our club is soon to have an election to fill vacancies on the board due to terms running out. our club also has a history of members not wanting to actually get involved in the running of the club. If we fail to have enough members accept nomination to fill all the positions, do we simply leave them vacant until after the election and then hope the board can find someone to appoint to fill the positions? This scenario is not covered in our by-laws, only vacancies occurring mid-term are covered.

[hmtcastle]

our club is soon to have an election to fill vacancies on the board due to terms running out. our club also has a history of members not wanting to actually get involved in the running of the club. If we fail to have enough members accept nomination to fill all the positions, do we simply leave them vacant until after the election and then hope the board can find someone to appoint to fill the positions? This scenario is not covered in our by-laws, only vacancies occurring mid-term are covered.

You have to keep voting until someone is elected (and willing to serve). You can't use your mid-term vacancy-filling process to complete the election.

If there aren't enough people willing to serve,, maybe your board is too large, maybe you don't need a board at all, or maybe your organization has outlived its useful life.

[Guest Guest]

You have to keep voting until someone is elected (and willing to serve). You can't use your mid-term vacancy-filling process to complete the election.

If there aren't enough people willing to serve,, maybe your board is too large, maybe you don't need a board at all, or maybe your organization has outlived its useful life.

Exactly what is the procedure to 'keep voting until someone is elected' if you have no one willing to serve when it is election time. Our by-laws state that nominations cannot be made from the floor the night of election. They must be done at the meeting prior to.

[hmtcastle]

Our by-laws state that nominations cannot be made from the floor the night of election. They must be done at the meeting prior to.

Well, you have to live with the rules you've adopted. How about write-in votes? How about amending the bylaws to change the rules that aren't working for you?

[Guest Guest]

Well, you have to live with the rules you've adopted. How about write-in votes? How about amending the bylaws to change the rules that aren't working for you?

would a write in vote be considered a nomination? If so, our by-laws prevent that option also.

[hmtcastle]

would a write in vote be considered a nomination? If so, our by-laws prevent that option also.

A write-in vote is a vote for someone who wasn't nominated. The fundamental principle is that a member with the right to vote has a right to vote for whomever he wants.

Again, your rules may vary.

[Guest Guest]

A write-in vote is a vote for someone who wasn't nominated. The fundamental principle is that a member with the right to vote has a right to vote for whomever he wants.

Again, your rules may vary.

Thanks for all the information. Hopefully it won't come to any of this.

[Guest Sam Raderer]

In the situation above, could the mmeting be suspended until candidates are found?

[Kim Goldsworthy]

In the situation above, could the meeting be suspended until candidates are found?

No.

Meetings are not to be suspended.

The election might be postponed.

[Guest Sam Raderer]

No.

Meetings are not to be suspended.

The election might be postponed.

[Guest Sam Raderer]

If the meeting is called with elections being the only order of business allowed, how can the election be postponed without suspending the meeting?

[Guest Guest]

If the meeting is called with elections being the only order of business allowed, how can the election be postponed without suspending the meeting?

elections take place at the annual meeting with at least 2 months prior for candidates to come forward.

[hmtcastle]

If the meeting is called with elections being the only order of business allowed, how can the election be postponed without suspending the meeting?

There is no such thing as "suspending" a meeting. The meeting can be adjourned to another time or the election can simply be continued at the next regular (or special) meeting.

[Gary c Tesser]

I suspect that Guest_Sam Raderer is not quite asking about the same issue that the Original Poster, Guest Guest (an unfortunately confusingly common name on this forum) wants to know about. And they might even not be asking about the same organization. If I'm right about this, I advise Guest Sam Raderer to post his question, dealing with his own, different, situation, as a new topic/subject. If he doesn't, then misunderstanding is inevitable. (And if it's really the same situation, please straighten me out.)

It seems clearly probable to me that these are unrelated questions (though having an understandable resemblance) because Mr Raderer and Mr (or, good hevvins, Ms) Guest seem to be replying at cross-purposes.

Notwithstanding that, I think possibly Mr Raderer might be helping here with Mr Guest's problem. Notwithstanding that Mr Raderer fails to properly use parliamentary jargon (tsk tsk) when he suggests "suspending" a meeting, which solecism arouses the indignation of Mr Goldsworthy and Mr Mountcastle (both at once, neat trick), it looks as if he's proposing that the meeting be briefly RECESSED (will that niggling terminology do, parli-nerds?) while we beat the bushes to dig up willing candidates.

To Mr Raderer's question: Assuming that you're going to go by Kim Goldsworthy's misleadingly cryptic or elliptical statement, you would, as he said, postpone the election -- to a follow-up meeting, of course, which you will have established. Then, since you have nothing else to think of to do, you have to go home. So you adjourn -- end -- this meeting.

(And just to try to cover all bases, you don't really have to go home. You can go have dinner in a diner. Go to a movie with your wife. Or husband, if you're a woman. Go to a Karioki bar and sing off-key, as you always do, you offense to civilization. Have an assignation with your illicit lover, you cad.

(O I think perhaps I have got worked up and digressed from the issue.)