Should the BOD and/or MOD Forums be open for READ ONLY to MAAST Charter Members?

[Bill S]

What the title says. I advocated that position a few years ago. Here is/was my reasoning. Each time one or more BODs or MODs get together in their forums and discuss club business, it is technically "a meeting". There are minutes (the notes) of those "meetings", and they should be available to the paid membership to view (a Read Only Forum). Right now the Bylaws say the results of all online forum voting by the BOD is to be posted in the Minutes. I've not seen that so far. This could eliminate that need.

I'm hoping that this thread/poll won't get deleted. But, since I'm the OP, I can make my own rules, right? OK, lets try not to get too personal (me too), and open discussions and thread creep are encouraged.

Here are your choices:

1) Both should be READ ONLY to Charter Members
2) Only MOD should be READ ONLY to Charter Members
3) Only BOD should be READ ONLY to Charter Members
4) No, I don't think anything should be open.

[allan]

I would hate the fact that if I was getting a warning for anything that it would then be open information.

I would hate a discussion involved over the interpretation of something I wrote not being understood because of poor grammar or spelling to be visible anyone other than those trying to figure out whether or not I was inciting or attacking or what ever the case.

I would hate it if I were a sponsor attempting to raise a concern that was now open to both the public and even my competitors.

I would hate the fact that attempting to work in a glass office can be quite bothersome.

I would hate the fact that each and every time I report a post it would be visible to the entire population.

I would hate the fact that members will be less inclined to report a post because their anonymity is gone.

I could probably go on. But the bottom line is that I think it's a foolish suggestion. But at least it came at a time when we have nothing else going on.

[Zack]

I don't believe so. Having been a moderator and a bod, there are many different opinions in both forums reguarding an issue. We debate these issues and come to a polished agreement and release it to the public. We also have contracts with sponsors and members (inb4 posting pms publicly) and if these were readable this would violate the terms (what happened on FB being a different thing completely) which would lead to a seperate private sub forum for messages and basically make this irrelevant as the case could b made that not everything is readable. I'm not sure what angle your getting at with this being posted, but as stated, you do believe there is some corruption in the bod. Why not start a vote of no confidence?

Also, let's say an issue happened with user x and certain mods disagree and certain mods agree with an action. If his is public, there could be potential backlash for a specific mod. Just my .02 not related to any other bods

[FireWater]

Bill, I like ya. However I do not feel as if this is a great idea at all. Several good points have been made by Allan and Zack. With anonymity gone in the MOD area what would be the point of having it?

[Zack]

Furthermore, meeting defined as :

Meeting: an assembly of people, esp. the members of a society or committee, for discussion or entertainment.

Assembly: a group of people gathered together in one place for a common purpose.

I'd also argue that since bod meetings have never been held online (as far as I know), these definitions would be relative to our de facto situation that meetings are held quarterly and in person, thus making the basis of your argument invalid.

per bylaws:

g. The right to attend and observe Board meetings.

attend defined as : be present at (an event, meeting, or function).

present defined as: of a person in a particular place. The and making it so you can't have one without the other. And I completely agree with what allan listed above.

[Bill S]

I'd also argue that since bod meetings have never been held online (as far as I know), these definitions would be relative to our de facto situation that meetings are held quarterly and in person, thus making the basis of your argument invalid..

As you are a member of the BOD, you might want to take a gander at the Bylaws again. If you are going to use them in a statement of position, you should at least be correct. Y'all DO realize that the Bylaws REQUIRE you (the BOD) to post the results of each and every vote you take in your Double Secret Probation Forum in the Club Minutes, right?

ARTICLE IV – MEETINGS

Section 3. Conducting Business By Forum Vote

Paragraph 1. Notice of an agenda item must be posted in the Directors Forum or appropriate Membership Forum by a member of the Board of Directors and remain open for discussion for:

a. A period of no less than 5 days for Membership or,
b. A period of no less than 2 days for Board of Directors

Paragraph 2. Upon closure by expiration of the agenda item discussion, a motion for either further discussion or a vote will be made.

Paragraph 3. Voting shall begin only after notice of the agenda item has been been provided a full discussion. The voting period shall remain open for:

a. A period of no less than 5 days for Membership
b. A period of no less than 1 day for Board of Directors

Paragraph 4. Quorum and Majority Vote results shall be determined upon expiration of the agenda item vote. Quorum and majority shall consist of:

a. Not less than one-fifth (1/5) of all the voting membership with a simple majority vote or,
b. Not less than two-thirds (2/3) of all the Board of Directors with a seventy-five percent majority of the yes/no votes.

Paragraph 5. Votes will be certified only upon expiration of the poll with the quorum count and final poll results being stated. Results and effective date of certified vote will be added to the meeting minutes at the next scheduled meeting.

[Mr Cob]

As a sponsor and club member I'm against an open read only front office...for all the reasons listed above and there are plenty more.

If there is reason to suspect ill activity behind the scenes then I think the proper protocol word be for the membership to select a person or two to audit the threads etc in the front office and relay that information to the membership in a formal format which would not disclose personal information of sponsors and members.

Not sure of how that would be done but Jason did mention in another thread about there being a reference in the bylaws that anyone can request temporary access to the front office.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-N900A using Tapatalk

[Zack]

I'm still not seeing where the discussion has to be posted leading up to a vote. Furthermore I'd argue that final poll results meaning if the yays or nays have it. Since these are under the veil of meetings I'd still argue that meetings would be defined as in person.

[Zack]

And in reguard to votes being published, it's been a little hectic lately, so the posting of minutes isn't exactly top priority (although I assure you they are being worked on.) like Allan said in another thread, there's not a timetable for these being posted I.e have these posted one week after meeting, but rest assured everything is slowly but surely getting taken care of. The last meeting was 10 days ago bill

[ramsey]

"Results and effective date of certified vote will be added to the meeting minutes at the next scheduled meeting."

This is very different than what you're trying to advocate here. Results are the outcome of some work, not documentation of all the work leading up to it.