Re: Weekly bludgeoning: Voting issues

[Erik Olson <erik@thekrib.com>]

Hi folks,

I think that many people are saying things but we are still not all
communicating on the same page.  

On Wed, 24 May 2000, Mary McCaw wrote:

>  Bob told me
> that once these decisions are made, drafting the by-laws and doing the
> paperwork so that we can become a nonprofit organization will be a half a
> day's work for him.

Great. This is an important point, one that had been implied, but not been
stated outright. I think that's why I am trying to push everyone towards
consensus on what we WANT.  We do not have to draw any official bylaws up,
just come to an agreement on what we would like as an organization.  Then
we can hand that to Bob and he can come up with some questions back for
us, and get the process rolling.

> If the group feels more comfortable adopting the by-laws of another hobbyist
> group, we can use Bob Cashin's previous work.

I was hoping we could utilize the discussions that were held around Bob
Cashin's template to help avoid some of the extra later discussion.
Perhaps there wasn't that much value in those discussions, but it helped
me to find out "where we'd been".

> As far as taking a straw vote is concerned, I personally wouldn't feel
> comfortable voting on something without knowing all the facts.  I can't see
> that a couple of days delay after asking Bob a question is going to make
> that much of a diference, but whatever.  

We still haven't come to a consensus on whether we think members should
vote.  I don't understand why asking Bob if it's technically feasible has
any bearing as to whether we want to do it.

> But it may be that what the group
> seems to want, a membership structure plus the right of the SC to remove
> destructive members, may be extremely difficult to accomplish in
> Massachusetts.

This may be the fundamental difference in our thinking.  Perhaps I am
wrong here, but I do not think we should be designing the bylaws based on
what works most conveniently for a particular state's laws; I think that
we should be designing what seems appropriate for the organization, and
*then* adjusting to make it work legally.  Personally, I think we have a
"clique" image problem and that a yearly voting of our members would help
change this.

> So the group should resolve whether or not giving the
> membership a vote is so important that it should supersede other needs that
> the group might have.

I beleive that if one goes back to Bob's first posting, this was the very
first question he needed answered.  And this is why I am trying to get
anyone else who has issues here to state them and then it can be taken to
the steering committee for a vote.  (more next message).

  - Erik

-- 
Erik Olson
erik at thekrib dot com

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