Electing Club Officers for 2009

At the October business meeting it was suggested that club members who won't be at the holiday party should be allowed to vote for officers via email. There were good arguments made on both sides of this question, and it was left that I (as current President) would look at the bylaws and set a procedure for this year's election based on what I found. Here are the parts of the BFD bylaws that seemed to me to be relevant to this question:

Section II-4 - Rights and Liability of Members Each regular member of the club shall have the right to vote on club matters provided they are in attendance during a regularly scheduled BFD Business meeting.

Section III-3 - Election Dates Regular elections are held annually with nominations at the December meeting. Voting will be held at the last meeting of the year and the new officers take office on January 1st. Special elections may be held as determined by the majority vote of the club officers.

By my reading of the bylaws email voting for officers (or anything else) is not allowed because the right of members to vote is dependant upon their attendance at a regularly scheduled BFD business meeting (II-4) and officers are to be nominated at the December meeting (III-3).

As was discussed at the October meeting, in order to have time for people to know all the nominees for office and vote via email before the December meeting nominations would have to be closed before that meeting and the bylaws require the nominations to be made then. In practice, I see no reason why nominations cannot be made before December (at the October or November meetings) and then made official at the December meeting.

To change the way the elections are held will require changing the bylaws. These bylaws were revised a few years ago with LOTS of discussion and input from the members of the club. I don't think they should be revised without careful consideration and adequate time for members to discuss the changes being made - as required by the bylaws:

Section IX-2 - Procedure for Changes Any regular member may make a motion for a change in the bylaws at any regularly scheduled monthly business meeting. When changes are suggested, the petition must be presented in writing. The vote on this motion will be at the next regularly scheduled monthly business meeting. The officers of the club will make every reasonable attempt to notify all regular members of the impending vote within ten days prior to the vote, but they are under no obligation to do so. Failure to notify the membership does not negate the scheduled vote. A vote of the majority of the regular members in attendance is required to approve a change in the existing bylaws.

So, officers for 2009 will be voted on at the Business Meeting held in connection with the holiday party which will be at the Fairbrother's (in Londonderry) on December 13, 2008. The bylaws do not specify who will run the elections. In the past the Treasurer has done so, but this year the President will run the election because our current Treasurer is running for office and I am not.

Nominations for office (President, Vice President, Treasurer, and Secretary) will be open until I close them so that voting can begin during the December meeting. Nominations must be made at a business meeting because they require a second by another member. If you want to make a nomination and cannot attend the November or December meeting you can email the Vice President (who checks his email more often than I do) and he will bring your nomination forward at a meeting. If it receives a second at the meeting it will be considered a valid nomination.