board77

APPROVED TEXT

This text is in addition to what was already approved when we voted on the committee that would handle charter amendments, shown below.

Committee Procedure

The committee will convene in the Jury Room for deciding whether the Charter should be amended and for drafting the amendment. The committee itself will vote on elements of the amendment before presenting a final form to the membership for ratification.

The membership will be given ten full days to discuss the amendment. During that period, anything deemed controversial may be removed and tabled for later consideration, or the amendment may be withdrawn. Following the discussion a yes/no poll will be posted in the thread and members will vote for ten full days whether or not to ratify the amendment.

A Global email will be sent to all registered member at the start of the discussion and at the start of the vote.

Quorum and Majority Requirements
In order for a ratification vote to be valid, sufficient votes must be cast to reach a quorum, defined as follows:
• Records will be maintained for the proportion of members who voted in the last seven elections that required a quorum.
• ‘Proportion of members who voted’ will be calculated as the number of votes cast divided by the number of members active over the sixty days prior to the vote.
• A moving average of those last seven proportions will be calculated, converted to a percentage, and 5% will be deducted to account for variation.
• The resulting percent will be multiplied by the number of members active during the sixty days prior to the posting of the ratification thread, and that will be the number of votes required for a quorum.

Records necessary for calculating a quorum will be maintained by the Mayor and posted in Michel Delving where the members can see them.

The number of votes that must be cast to reach a quorum will be posted in the ratification thread.

If the vote has not attained a quorum at the end of the voting period, voting may be extended for an additional seven days. If, at the end of the extension period, a quorum has still not been obtained the proposition will be considered defeated.

In order for an Amendment to be ratified, 67% of those voting must approve. This provision will be posted in the ratification thread.

If the quorum as calculated from a moving average falls below 20%, the Committee for Amendments to the Charter will convene to reconsider our participation requirements.

Archiving the Voting Results
When voting has concluded (or the amendment has been withdrawn), the threads used by the committee in the Jury Room and the ratification thread in the Business Room will be archived in the forum entitled “Threads of Historical Interest”. A Directory thread will be created and links to all individual threads related to Charter Amendments will be posted there, preferably in chronological order, so that it will be easy for members to find and review them.
______________________________________________
TEXT APPROVED UNDER ARTICLE 11, MOVED HERE
(first and last paragraph also appear in Article 11)

The committee to Amend the Charter will convene under two circumstances:
• A Ranger has exercised Extraordinary powers requiring review in accordance with Article 3, ¶5. The committee will decide whether the circumstance is anticipated to occur again with sufficient frequency to justify an Amendment to the Charter;
• An Initiative to amend the Charter is brought by the Mayor, or by two current Rangers, or by five members regardless of their status.

Composition of the Committee
The committee will have an odd number of members, no fewer than seven, no more than thirteen. The Mayor and one Loremaster will be voting members of this committee. The composition of the rest of the committee will be as follows:

If the committee was convened after the exercise of Extraordinary powers by a Ranger, it will also include:
• the current Ranger who was involved in the incident and one other current Ranger;
• one former Ranger;
• a minimum of two volunteers from among the rest of the membership.

If the committee was convened by an initiative of the Mayor or two current Rangers, it will also include:
• the two current Rangers who brought the initiative;
• one former Ranger;
• a minimum of two volunteers from among the rest of the membership.

If the committee was convened by an initiative of the members, it will also include:
• one current Ranger;
• one former Ranger;
• a minimum of three volunteers from among the membership, one of whom will be a member who brought the initiative;
• and if five or more volunteers are accepted from among the membership, two of them will be members who brought the initiative.

The Committee will be convened by posting a sticky thread in the Business Forum and accepting volunteers in order until the committee is filled and composed as required. Any registered member may serve on the committee.

Committee Procedure
The committee will convene in the Jury Room for deciding whether the Charter should be amended and for drafting the amendment. The committee itself will vote on elements of the amendment before presenting a final form to the membership for ratification.

The ratification procedure and the archiving of committee threads, ratification thread, and committee ballots with voting results must be completed in accordance with Article 12, ¶2.
_____________________________________________________
Original Post:
Article 12, ¶2. The Final Frontier.

This is the very last paragraph we will have to write for the Charter folks. It would be nice if we could discuss it together with Thread Deletions and Statutes of Limitations and vote on them simulataneously.

Then, approving the long list of minor corrections is the last thing we have to do.

The issue here is the definition of a quorum and the supermajority required for a win.

Since we are voting tomorrow on the definition of a quorum for Binding Votes, we might want simply to import the same definition into this article. That would be the quick and easy way to do it.

We might want a stricter requirements for both the quorum and the required majority where charter amendments are concerned.

I leave it up to you.

Jn

Quote:

Then, approving the long list of minor corrections is the last thing we have to do.

Besides actually naming the Charter, of course.

Yes.

You're going to lead that one.

Jn

.. and actually doing all the updates I'll be having some uploading fun while the Rangers can do some post editing and Jny will probably revise and double check I don't know how many threads and Ax will finally get that 'pretty please put everything into pdf format' email that's been sitting in my draft email box for ages

*cough* right, Voronwe will open a new thread on the naming

.. and we're back to the final frontier!

I never like the easy way
which goes to say I think we'll need a more stringent definitions of a quorum and the supermajority required for a win where charter amendments are concerned. However, depending on tomorrows vote and the outcome, we just might get away with the easy way.

And now I'm stealing from over at the other thread because I'm simply sooo tired to give my input:

For a vote to be binding, a quorum of the members must vote, defined as: 50% of the number of members active over the past 90 days

It is my understanding that polls to change the constitution in the future will be simple polls (YES/NO)and I would go all out for a supermajority of 67%.

(more strict on the numbers involved to actually reach a quorum but more lenient in the overall majority)

_______________
Resident witchâ„¢

more strict on the numbers involved to actually reach a quorum but more lenient in the overall majority

That's a good strategy, Alandriel!

And I'm thinking that if people are very worried about our ability to make a quorum, the reverse should also be true - if the quorum ends up being very low, the supermajority should be higher.

I can make sure that any choices on the ballot reflect this trade-off if others feel it is appropriate.

Jn

Jnyusa wrote:

Yes.

You're going to lead that one.

Such as it is.

Ok - here's what we decided for Binding Votes.

For a vote to be binding, a quorum of the members must vote, defined as 30% of the number of members active over the past 60 days.

If a simple poll or two-choice secret ballot is used, the proposition(s) will be accepted if 67% of the voting members accept it.

(Ratifications are always up/down votes so only the two-choice poll is relevant here.)

Are these numbers also satisfactory for Charter Amendments, or is there a feeling that the requirements should be stricter? I'll draft a ballot with as many alternatives as you want.


Jn

Go for what's simple, I say.

I think both those requirements are fine as they stand. The quorum formula is realistic, and the required majority is comfortably familiar to this U.S. voter.

I agree.

I am initially inclined to say that amendments to the constitution should require a 75% vote with a quorum of 40% of users over the last 60 days.

Perhaps this is too strict, though.

I won't be upset if we go with 67% with quorum 30% -- 60 days.

It's just that I think it should be a little harder than that to change the mission statement, for example. But maybe those numbers are already hard enough!

I agree with that, too.

I guess I'm just too damn agreeable these days.

I don't know.... grrr.... I've mulled over this for some time now but deep inside I'm not happy with 30% over the last 60 days to reach a quorum.
It seems so little to change the constitution. I would feel more comfy with 40%. After all I think there should be a distinction between 'normal' stuff and 'changing/ammending the constitution stuff'.

67% supermajority is fine with me

_______________
Resident witchâ„¢

Maybe some friendly Ranger could give us an idea of the numbers we're talking about. In mortal guise, I no longer can sort the memberlist by date of last activity. 30% or 40% of how many? Then we could compare that to our experience of turnout for recent votes.

I agree with Viv.

Prim, here are the numbers that I quoted last week.

Quote:

Total Active Today (July 1, 2005): 92
Total Active Yesterday or Today: 118
Total Active during the past 5 days: 139
Total Active during the past 30 days: 175
Total Active during the past 60 days: 183
Total Active during the past 90 days: 192
Total Active some time: 203
Total Members: 213

I agree with Faramond. For something of this gravity, the quorum should be stricter. I don't think 40% is too much to ask.

Thanks, Voronwe! I wasn't here when you posted those.

Well, 40% of those active over 60 days, rounding up, is 74 votes—which is about equal to the largest turnout we've ever had.

And I'm sure that was for a simple poll. Turnout for complex ballots is lucky to hit 50.

Are we deliberately picking a number that's hard to hit? I'm not necessarily opposed to that when it comes to amending the charter, but we should acknowledge it if that's the case.

Primula_Baggins wrote:

Are we deliberately picking a number that's hard to hit? I'm not necessarily opposed to that when it comes to amending the charter, but we should acknowledge it if that's the case.

I don't think so. It's more that it's imporant to make sure that enough people vote in something as big as amending the charter. 67% of 30% could still be a minority of the members. Of course, if the other 70% doesn't care enough to vote, then I suppose that's what they get.

I think what's important is that we not pick a number that is impossible to hit or we will never be able to amend the Charter.

But of course we also don't want to create a situation where the same 18% of the members is voting, making decisions, virtually running the board all the time.

I think that keeping about 30% of the members permantly active would be a good goal, philosophically speaking. The 40%/75% that Faramond mentioned comes pretty close to that - it multiplies out to 28% of the total membership giving approval to amendments.

But I realize that this means there needs to be a culture of continuous mobilization, an ongoing fight against apathy.

Jn

Jnyusa wrote:

But I realize that this means there needs to be a culture of continuous mobilization, an ongoing fight against apathy.

Jn

Well, we could have less worthy goals.

Quote:

But of course we also don't want to create a situation where the same 18% of the members is voting, making decisions, virtually running the board all the time.

I don't know if I agree. I mean, if only 18% of the members care about these things, maybe that 18% SHOULD be running the board all the time.