there must have been a better way to do this...

[cellio]

The following from the corporate seneschal's report of the latest SCA board meeting left me scratching my head:

Motion by Gabrielle Underwood to revoke and deny the membership of Clarence Womble (Eoin Mac Lochlainn) effective January 26, 2007. Seconded by Jeff Brown. In favor: None. Opposed: Jeff Brown, Heather English, Tom Hughes, Hal Simon, Gabrielle Underwood. Recused: Shawn Reed. Motion failed.

Motion by Gabrielle Underwood to revoke and deny the membership of Clarence Womble (Eoin Mac Lochlainn) effective January 27, 2007. Seconded by Jeff Brown. In favor: Jeff Brown, Heather English, Tom Hughes, Hal Simon, Gabrielle Underwood, Opposed: None. Recused: Shawn Reed. Chairman Williams exercised his option to vote and did so in favor of the motion. Motion carried.

I had to read it a couple times to spot the difference. They changed the effective date. That's all. There has to have been a better way to do that, no? Doesn't standard parliamentary procedure permit both amending and withdrawing a motion on the table?

When I read the first one my reaction was "wow, the case for this was so weak that even the person making the motion recanted". But (and noting that we do not have access to the actual discussion), that appears not to have been the case.

Comments

Re: Banishments

[sdorn.livejournal.com]

Under Robert's Rules of Order, it would have been simpler to amend the motion. But under Robert's, you also don't write down the names of everyone voting unless the by-laws or other documents require a roll call for all votes or unless a member of the body calls for a roll call (and that's usually done only when someone on the losing end thinks after a division of the house that minds will change if there's a roll call). Either they're following a different system or they're incredibly inefficient at running meetings.

Re: Banination

[brokengoose.livejournal.com]

I've seen groups who use modified rules to prevent "rule hacking" (I move to amend the motion to support the amendment to the motion..." etc.).

"If a motion is made and seconded, it must be voted upon immediately" is a fairly common adjustment to Robert's Rules. If that was in play here, there may have been some disagreement about the date. Somebody got sick of it and called for a vote. They were shot down, and the matter was discussed more. After a date was worked out, they called for another vote. That's speculation piled on top of speculation, though.

Re: Banishments

[cellio]

Either they're following a different system or they're incredibly inefficient at running meetings.

Why choose? :-) The SCA board is, or at least used to be, remarkably bad at doing things correctly or consistently. The most egregious example that I have personal knowledge of is when they made an illegal bylaws change, made policy based on that change, stirred up a firestorm and a lawsuit, and ended up undoing the policy change but refusing to undo the bylaws change. I just don't get that. I can see accidentally making an illegal change, and I think that's probably what happened, but then to be so uninterested in going back and fixing it... boggle. (That said, it's not just the corporation either. My own local group recently made, or quasi-made, an illegal change to its policies. When I pointed it out, the reaction of the officers was "shrug, it doesn't matter anyway". I wasn't inclined to ever be a local officer again anyway, but that would make me even less inclined.)

I don't think the people running the SCA are, generally, malicious. I do think enough of them are inept to cause problems for the rest. This is a spare-time activity for everyone and most are ameteurs; mistakes are bound to happen.

Ok, I'm curious enough to check. SCA governing documents say the board follows The Standard Code of Parliamentary Procedure by Alice Sturgis (except as stated in the bylaws).

Re: Banishments

[sethg]

I have Marshall McLuhan Robert's Rules of Order, Newly Revised, right here...which says, FWIW, that a "Previous Question" motion (commonly known as "calling the question", i.e., asking that debate end and the main motion be voted on) has precendence over a motion to amend (and all other subsidiary motions, except for a motion to lay on the table) and may not be debated.