Board actions by email

[Guest Wahooneb]

I understand that Robert's Rules of Order does not approve of meetings by email, but we have been doing club business for the past few years using email because of the significant differences in location of the board members.

In the transaction of the email business one member has called a point of order and another member has said that there can't be a point of order unless there is an on-going meeting.

One train of thought is that there is a defacto meeting in progress if the chairman has called for a vote. The person who says that there can't be a point of order unless there is as on-going meeting also wants the vote to be held.

So if there is no meeting that would be on-going for a point of order to be called would it follow that there is no on-going meeting for a vote to be held?

All of this sounds crazy but there is a big split in the voting members and people are just making up things as they go along.

Is there any help in RRoO for this situation?

[Larry Cisar]

I understand that Robert's Rules of Order does not approve of meetings by email, but we have been doing club business for the past few years using email because of the significant differences in location of the board members.

In the transaction of the email business one member has called a point of order and another member has said that there can't be a point of order unless there is an on-going meeting.

One train of thought is that there is a defacto meeting in progress if the chairman has called for a vote. The person who says that there can't be a point of order unless there is as on-going meeting also wants the vote to be held.

So if there is no meeting that would be on-going for a point of order to be called would it follow that there is no on-going meeting for a vote to be held?

All of this sounds crazy but there is a big split in the voting members and people are just making up things as they go along.

Is there any help in RRoO for this situation?

If your bylaws are silent about electronic meetings, you are out of luck as nothing can be done in them. If you bylaws are not silent about electronic meetings, see them to answer your questions. Nothing in RONR will help you.

[hmtcastle]

So if there is no meeting that would be on-going for a point of order to be called would it follow that there is no on-going meeting for a vote to be held?

Yes. If the members are not (physically) present in the same room, it's not a meeting in the parliamentary sense of the word and no business can be conducted.

[David A Foulkes]

I understand that Robert's Rules of Order does not approve of meetings by email, but we have been doing club business for the past few years using email because of the significant differences in location of the board members.

In the transaction of the email business one member has called a point of order and another member has said that there can't be a point of order unless there is an on-going meeting.

One train of thought is that there is a defacto meeting in progress if the chairman has called for a vote. The person who says that there can't be a point of order unless there is as on-going meeting also wants the vote to be held.

So if there is no meeting that would be on-going for a point of order to be called would it follow that there is no on-going meeting for a vote to be held?

All of this sounds crazy but there is a big split in the voting members and people are just making up things as they go along.

Is there any help in RRoO for this situation?

A clear-cut case of wanting to have your cake and eat it to, which is heavily documented as being disallowed (tip: try Googling "why can't I have my cake and eat it to?").

Any such email business "must be expressly authorized by the bylaws and should be supported by special rules of order or standing rules as appropriate[.]" (RONR 10th Ed., p.2 footnote, emphasis added) Otherwise, this is the kind of mess you get into.

And I'm not sure the phrase "on-going meeting" is used in RONR anyway, so that's a little bit of distractionary horse-hockey thrown in to muddle the issue.

You might also want to read up on the Executive Committee concept on page 468, which RONR does recommend as a means of dealing with the problems associated with Boards whose members are geographically distanced in such a way as to make "on-going meetings" difficult.

[tctheatc]

In the transaction of the email business one member has called a point of order....

Haven't even finished reading the original post in its entirety yet, much less the replies. But I just wanted to note that this line gave me more of a chuckle than anything else I've EVER seen on this forum! Sorry, no offense meant, just tickled me I guess. back to reading and learning...

OK, I've read it all now. Seems to me that if you're having e-mail exchanges like this to do business, you have no meeting at all and parliamentary procedure is not an issue. In effect, all you have is someone (individual or a few) making illicit decisions and getting the input of others electronically. You can CALL it a vote, but IMHO it ain't. It's just someone saying "I have decided xxxxx. Who's with me?"