[DRAFT 1] Bylwas Revision: COMMITTEES

[Here's my first attempt at putting all the bullet points into words.
Please comment. I think I took all feedback into account- thanks!

--Nils]

COMMITTEES
----------

Committees are an extension of the board of directors and take care of the
day to day operation of the organization. They are set up to deal with
ongoing issues within the organization.

[is there a better wording for this? I'm trying to say that you should not
set up a committee for i.e. one trade show, but should set up a publicity
committee that coordinates shows etc.]

Committees are governed by the board of directors and are accountable to
the board and the membership.

[should this be further defined? I'm thinking of where they send the
minutes, and where they get their direction from... 'governed' can mean a
lot of things, and I'm not sure if I should narrow this down, or leave it to
the charter.]

Committees may propose resolutions and motions within the scope of their
charter. Discussions should be held in a public forum, but the committee
may have private discussions if they are deemed necessary.

Charter
-------
The committee charter completely describes the rights and responsibilities
of the committee, as well as its structure, membership policies, and any
other relevant details. Charters are issued and revoked by the board of
directors. The charter shall be put before the membership for review and
discussion before it is voted on by the board of directors.

The charter shall also define the membership structure of the committee.
Both contributing and non contributing members are eligible to serve on
committees.

[I've changed my mind. I think that non contributing members should also be
able to serve on committees... I don't think they'd get selected for highly
political committees, but would get selected for i.e. a publicity committee.
That way then can contribute. In fact, I'm sure this is a good idea- gets
the non contribs more involved, which is a Good Thing (tm).]

QUESTIONS:
----------
- does this cover everything? Darren made a good point, saying that only
the basic definitions common to all committees belong in here, and I agree.
I'd been trying to do that, but it's easy to lose sight of that goal.

--
Nils Lohner Software in the Public Interest, Inc.
E-Mail: lohner(at)spi-inc(dot)org PO Box 1326
Board Of Directors <board(at)spi-inc(dot)org> Boston, Ma. 02117 USA

On Thu, Apr 08, 1999 at 12:13:17PM -0400, Nils Lohner wrote:
> Committees are an extension of the board of directors and take care of the
> day to day operation of the organization. They are set up to deal with
> ongoing issues within the organization.
Committees are an extension of the board of directors and take care of the
daily ongoing concerns of the organization|corporation. They are not to be
formed for one-time or short term situations.

> Committees are governed by the board of directors and are accountable to
> the board and the membership.
>
> [should this be further defined? I'm thinking of where they send the
> minutes, and where they get their direction from... 'governed' can mean a
> lot of things, and I'm not sure if I should narrow this down, or leave it to
> the charter.]
Charter...

--
Please cc all mailing list replies to me, also.
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On Thu, 8 Apr 1999, Darren O. Benham wrote:

> On Thu, Apr 08, 1999 at 12:13:17PM -0400, Nils Lohner wrote:
> > Committees are an extension of the board of directors and take care of the
> > day to day operation of the organization. They are set up to deal with
> > ongoing issues within the organization.
> Committees are an extension of the board of directors and take care of the
> daily ongoing concerns of the organization|corporation. They are not to be
> formed for one-time or short term situations.

How do we deal with short term situations or one time issues?

So board members alone are dealing with one time issues and there is a
prohibition against forming a committee for that purpose?

I am confused about this rule.

On Thu, 8 Apr 1999, Dale Scheetz wrote:

> On Thu, 8 Apr 1999, Christoph Lameter wrote:
>
> > On Thu, 8 Apr 1999, Darren O. Benham wrote:
> >
> > > On Thu, Apr 08, 1999 at 12:13:17PM -0400, Nils Lohner wrote:
> > > > Committees are an extension of the board of directors and take care of the
> > > > day to day operation of the organization. They are set up to deal with
> > > > ongoing issues within the organization.
> > > Committees are an extension of the board of directors and take care of the
> > > daily ongoing concerns of the organization|corporation. They are not to be
> > > formed for one-time or short term situations.
> >
> > How do we deal with short term situations or one time issues?
>
> If there is no current committee that is appropriate, I would assume that
> one of the board members would do the work, after consutation with fellow
> board members.

On Thu, 8 Apr 1999, Christoph Lameter wrote:

> On Thu, 8 Apr 1999, Darren O. Benham wrote:
>
> > On Thu, Apr 08, 1999 at 12:13:17PM -0400, Nils Lohner wrote:
> > > Committees are an extension of the board of directors and take care of the
> > > day to day operation of the organization. They are set up to deal with
> > > ongoing issues within the organization.
> > Committees are an extension of the board of directors and take care of the
> > daily ongoing concerns of the organization|corporation. They are not to be
> > formed for one-time or short term situations.
>
> How do we deal with short term situations or one time issues?

If there is no current committee that is appropriate, I would assume that
one of the board members would do the work, after consutation with fellow
board members.

Later,

Dwarf
--
_-_-_-_-_- Author of "The Debian Linux User's Guide" _-_-_-_-_-_-

aka Dale Scheetz Phone: 1 (850) 656-9769
Flexible Software 11000 McCrackin Road
e-mail: dwarf(at)polaris(dot)net Tallahassee, FL 32308

_-_-_-_-_-_- If you don't see what you want, just ask _-_-_-_-_-_-_-

On Thu, 8 Apr 1999, Christoph Lameter wrote:

> So board members alone are dealing with one time issues and there is a
> prohibition against forming a committee for that purpose?

I see no prohibition.

As I understood it, the board would issue committee charters for the tasks
that need to be done, which the board can't manage on its own. This part
of the bylaws indicates when, and how, that would be implimented.

>
> I am confused about this rule.

Probably because it is a guideline ;-)

Luck,

Dwarf
--
_-_-_-_-_- Author of "The Debian Linux User's Guide" _-_-_-_-_-_-

aka Dale Scheetz Phone: 1 (850) 656-9769
Flexible Software 11000 McCrackin Road
e-mail: dwarf(at)polaris(dot)net Tallahassee, FL 32308

_-_-_-_-_-_- If you don't see what you want, just ask _-_-_-_-_-_-_-

On Thu, Apr 08, 1999 at 12:05:23PM -0700, Christoph Lameter wrote:
> On Thu, 8 Apr 1999, Darren O. Benham wrote:
>
> > On Thu, Apr 08, 1999 at 12:13:17PM -0400, Nils Lohner wrote:
> > > Committees are an extension of the board of directors and take care of the
> > > day to day operation of the organization. They are set up to deal with
> > > ongoing issues within the organization.
> > Committees are an extension of the board of directors and take care of the
> > daily ongoing concerns of the organization|corporation. They are not to be
> > formed for one-time or short term situations.
>
> How do we deal with short term situations or one time issues?
The BOD needs SOME work to do ;) The short-term|one-time issues should
fall under one of the committees sphere's of influence.. if not, it's the
Board of Directors responsibility... after all, the commitees are only an
extention of the BOD...

>
>

--
Please cc all mailing list replies to me, also.
=========================================================================
* http://benham.net/index.html <gecko(at)benham(dot)net> <>< *
* -------------------- * -----------------------------------------------*
* Debian Developer, Debian Project Secretary, Debian Webmaster *
* <gecko(at)debian(dot)org> <secretary(at)debian(dot)org> <lintian-maint(at)debian(dot)org> *
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=========================================================================

On Thu, 8 Apr 1999, Nils Lohner wrote:

> Committees are an extension of the board of directors and take care of the
> day to day operation of the organization. They are set up to deal with
> ongoing issues within the organization.
>
> [is there a better wording for this? I'm trying to say that you should not
> set up a committee for i.e. one trade show, but should set up a publicity
> committee that coordinates shows etc.]

I think this sounds about right. I wasn't sure about the "extension to
the board of directors" part until I remembered SPI is a non-profit and
the board is legally source of all power (so this sort of translates
representative power from the membership's voting into a more legally
binding form). Uh, plus Darren Benham's suggestion for the one-time
thing.

> Committees are governed by the board of directors and are accountable to
> the board and the membership.
>
> [should this be further defined? I'm thinking of where they send the
> minutes, and where they get their direction from... 'governed' can mean a
> lot of things, and I'm not sure if I should narrow this down, or leave it to
> the charter.]

I'm not exactly sure what you mean by "governed", to tell the truth.
but the rest looks good.
>
> Committees may propose resolutions and motions within the scope of their
> charter. Discussions should be held in a public forum, but the committee
> may have private discussions if they are deemed necessary.
>
I think there should be some kind of open record keeping directive,
but I'll leave that for the charter section.
>
> Charter
> -------
> The committee charter completely describes the rights and responsibilities
> of the committee, as well as its structure, membership policies, and any
> other relevant details. Charters are issued and revoked by the board of
> directors. The charter shall be put before the membership for review and
> discussion before it is voted on by the board of directors.

I think this sounds about right in that it describes "meta-rules" for
charters. I think there should also be a mandate that the charter
provides a proactive (yeah, it's a management word, but I couldn't think
of a better one) process for providing information to the members/public.
I think this will help avert some of the non-open character of some things
in SPI previously (which I think probably arose from lack of time more
than a desire for closedness), by making the committee leadership find a
volunteer to specifically deal with it on a timely basis.

>
> The charter shall also define the membership structure of the committee.
> Both contributing and non contributing members are eligible to serve on
> committees.
>
> [I've changed my mind. I think that non contributing members should also be
> able to serve on committees... I don't think they'd get selected for highly
> political committees, but would get selected for i.e. a publicity committee.
> That way then can contribute. In fact, I'm sure this is a good idea- gets
> the non contribs more involved, which is a Good Thing (tm).]

I agree that non-contributing members should get to participate in
some committees. But since committees will largely be volunteer-filled, I
think it would be best to allow charters to specify that only contributing
members may join. But serving on a committee (or a "subcommittee" for
even more particular chores) should count towards becoming a contributing
member.

>
>
> QUESTIONS:
> ----------
> - does this cover everything? Darren made a good point, saying that only
> the basic definitions common to all committees belong in here, and I agree.
> I'd been trying to do that, but it's easy to lose sight of that goal.
>
I would be inclined to list some basic committees that should never be
allowed to dissolve completely, but then I might be paranoid ;-).

Lynn