1. The proposed bylaw changes were MAILED AFTER THE DATE OF BALLOTING ENDS. This alone makes the ballot completely invalid. The board will have to remail the entire thing with a new end date.
2. The board states in its introductory letter that they appointed a person to chair a committee and that this product is somehow the result of that committee's work. I chaired that committee, I resigned in April or May due to my mother's ill health and the realization that our recommendations would be unheeded. If this group indeed continued to meet "throughout the year", as I encouraged it to do, would the board be so kind as to post the member's names and the dates of their meetings? It is my understanding there were one or two meetings following me resignation and then all was left to the board.
3. Paragraph six fails to state that officers and appointees shall serve without pay or other compensation.
4. Election Supervision, paragraph 11A, fails to specify that a Director of Operations who is also a Board Member be disallowed from supervising elections. This is not good. There should be some specification that if the Director of Ops is running for election or is a current board member, another senior level staff member will oversee this process.
5. D - Revision of bylaws requiring 2/3 majority vote... A 2/3 majority of WHAT????? The membership? Those voting? With this language, since so few folks vote, nothing will ever pass because it is not defined properly.
6. 11E - way to go to keep people from putting anything on the ballot, guys!!! Talk about total control of the governance process reserved for the select few!!!!!
7. 13A -- recommend indemnification for members in direct language. All members are volunteers since they have to do a workshift.
8. 6E -- this is deeply alarming and makes the document internally contradictory. An outgoing board member is not gone until the new one is elected. Why, then, would a director of ops serve as a "non-voting board member" until said election? This would create a situation where there are SIX board members, which contradicts the very definition of Board of Directors in Section 3.
9. 4(B)3 -- Does this really go far enough now? Perhaps the addition of "working group or other affiliation that meets regularly". The community has changed enough over the years that not all working groups are called "covens" any more.
There is a lot more wrong with this document than I have time to review. That's a pity, because some things about it are very good. To ask the membership to approve such a radical set of revisions (none of which came recommended by the aforementioned review committee, by the way - except perhaps one or two tiny items) is asking for far too much.
But -- the document is prima facie invalid -- it was mailed AFTER the date required to be counted. Or was that just mine? If so, that's a violation in itself. I have the envelope -- I suggest others check theirs as well.
The board is trying to ram this through. Item 11E (6, above) is a problem all by itself. It takes ultimate control away from the membership. Period. There's just no way around that. We don't even get a 10% voter turn out. How is some member without access to the mailing list supposed to get 10% to sign a ballot measure? It's impossible on its face. Is that the point?
Don't vote for this atrocity. It's a mess, it's internally inconsistent, it decreases the ability of membership to make changes.
It would be far better for the board to issue a point by point ballot where folks could vote for against items on a line item basis. It's complicated, yes, but if the organization is worth running, it's worth running RIGHT.
I will be posting this on Colopagan as well, since not everyone comes over here. As moderator of that list I will encourage folks to discuss this issue in great detail in both venues.
Hawk Shadow