Identification of problems

[David B Harris]

On Fri, 14 Feb 2003 09:35:05 -0600
John Goerzen <jgoerzen at complete.org> wrote:
>    + First, I would like to point out that holding a meeting
>      "electronically" is not limited to IRC or real-time.  E-mail
>      clearly falls under that category.
> 
>    + Secondly, the current practice of the Board meeting monthly does
>      seem to be within the Board's powers, given that the President or
>      two board members can agree to set a meeting at anytime besides
>      the quarterly.
>  
>    + However, the practice of meetings by e-mail seems to be
>    out-of-order.
>      We will want to discuss if the e-mail meetings are a good idea,
>      and if so, explicitly authorize them.

I would suggest instead that you omit all references to _any_ types of
meeting in the by-laws. By-laws are supposedly to be helpful to an
organisation; unless there is a real need, limiting their meetings to
some given forum will only serve to ... well, limit them :)

I would suggest, instead, that a mandate for a certain number of
meetings be held in a certain time period, with minutes available
publicaly after <x> days. Leave it at that, and let the board conduct
business as is most suitable to both the business at hand and the
members of the board themselves.

>    + The directors are to be chosen in the same manner and style as
>    the
>      officers, but no procedure for the officers is given in the
>      bylaws. This is a serious problem, and we should consider
>      allowing the membership to do all these things.

Voting is not an end unto itself; it was created to solve specific
problems. Mainly, populaces were getting abused quite wholeheartedly. We
can see in the world around us that, now, people who have been elected
to power have found ways to abuse the populace nevertheless.

Elections aren't a magic bullet.

If you take the time to provide a run-down of what problems in SPI it
solves, and how it will let SPI do more business and better business,
I'll take the time to explain how it might do the opposite :)

(I won't bother if everybody here is hell-bent on voting because it's
currently the fashion.)

>    + The membership is not given a say in the removal of board
>      members.

Yeah, I do rather agree that the membership should be allowed to remove
board members.

>    + Treasurer's report must be "physically affixed"?

This is probably for legal/accounting purposes.
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