About the Blog and the Bylaws
This blog is available to UUCL members and friends for discussion of the proposed bylaws changes. It may be expanded to other issues, but for now we’d appreciate limiting your comments to the bylaws. And, of course, the usual rules of online etiquette apply.
We have not limited access to this blog, but we have attempted to keep it relatively private by blocking it from search engines and by declining to list it in any blog directory. Nevertheless, bear in mind that anything you post here could be seen by anyone.
Here are links to the current and proposed bylaws:
Please add your comments below. You can also click on the link at the right to take you to the UUCL Bylaws Committee page, where you’ll find contact information for the committee members and documents like meeting minutes and agendas.
November 13, 2007 at 9:34 am
Welcome to the newest way to communicate around the by-laws updates! Thank you so much to Mel Harkrader-Pine, who stepped right up to my request for help creating a blog. You did a great job Mel.
The by-laws committee will be checking this blog for comments as we work on updating the by-laws. So please read the by-laws (both current and proposed) and let us know your thoughts.
November 27, 2007 at 5:43 am
I want to thank the Bylaws committee for continuing the long, dry and much-needed work. In the wake of the initial congregational meeting on the bylaws, there are two issues that I recommend resolving before any others because they will determine who can decide the rest of the issues. It may be that these have already been addressed in the time since that meeting, but just in case…
1) It was made clear that the current bylaws do not provide any way to remove a member from the rolls, which has presented the problem of determining what constitutes a quorum when the official membership number is greatly inflated. My own recommendation is that the Bylaws committee do its best to determine a number reflecting active membership and settle on that number as valid for the purposes of determining quorum for bylaws revision. Until the bylaws have been revised to establish true ongoing membership requirements and the exec board has a chance to establish a true membership count, this artificial number is necessary. It should be determined in good faith and accepted as valid for the duration of Bylaws revision.
2) The other hurdle for making changes to Bylaws is proper notification. When the bylaws were first written, notification was to be done ‘by mail’ and this meant USPS. Email was never envisioned. Therefore there was a question at the first congregational Bylaws meeting as to whether email notification is sufficient notice by the existing Bylaws. For my part, I think email is sufficient. Email requires a little extra effort on the part of the sender to maintain an updated list and on the part of the recipient to ensure that s/he receives mailings, but other than that it is much more convenient and much less expensive than hard copy. It is nearly as universally accessible as snail mail, even to those with no material means as email accounts are available at no cost and internet access is freely available in our public libraries.
I don’t see a way to make much-needed changes to our Bylaws until the parameters for decision-making are established, specifically these two questions.
December 22, 2007 at 1:05 pm
When is the next meeting?