Dear Members (and especially our newest members),
It is time once again to ratify a piece of our Charter.
We have already voted on part of Article 4: Office of the Mayor, but we have some new paragraphs to add to it and some minor amendments.
We also have some additions and amendments to Article 5: Dispute Resolution.
HERE IS HOW THE PROCESS WORKS
All registered members may discuss and vote in this thread.
A summary of the provisions we are voting on is given below. There are also links to posts containing the full and complete text of each Article. [Parts already ratified are in small print at the top of the post; parts you are ratifying now are in large print at the bottom of the post.]
Before voting, we discuss in this thread for a minimum of ten days. During those ten days, you should state bluntly in this thread anything you don’t like.. If enough people dislike certain provisions, we will remove them from the text before the voting begins and allow the committee to work on them again until they are more acceptable to the membership.
At the end of the discussion, the vote opens and remains open for ten days, two weekends inclusive. The vote takes the form of a poll in this thread, where you vote either yes or no to approve these pieces of the Charter.
This vote opened late and will remain open until Monday, August 8, 11:59 pm Greenwich Mean Time.
(Translation: voting from July 22, ~8:00 pm Eastern Daylight Time or ~5:00 pm Pacific Daylight Time until August 1, ~8:00 pm Eastern Daylight Time or ~5:00 pm Pacific Daylight Time. )
SUMMARY OF ADDITIONS AND AMENDMENTS TO ARTICLE 4: OFFICE OF THE MAYOR
The full text of the article, including those parts already ratified, can be read IN THIS POST.
First, we have added the requirement that candidates for Mayor be 18 years of age or older, and that nominations of a candidate must be seconded by another member¶1.
We have set up terms by which Elections will be held in ¶4.
Elections will take place once a year. The upcoming election is announced on July 20 and the nomination period begins 30 days later on August 19. Nominations are accepted for 10 days. Voting begins on September 3 and ends on September 12. The current Mayor then transfers records and information to the Mayor-elect, and inauguration of the new Mayor takes place on September 22.
As a registered member, you may nominate or second one candidate, or run for office yourself! Current Rangers may run but they must resign their current Ranger term if they win.
Once nominations close, the current Mayor (who is right now an Honorary record-keeper only) will convene a committee of two helpers to create and post the ballot. Secret ballots will be cast by copying the ballot from the thread and submitting it by PM or email. The committee will count the vote and reports the results promptly.
We have also added a paragraph to this Article describing the grounds and procedures for removing the Mayor from office should this become necessary ¶5.
Because the Mayor is primarily a record-keeper the main concern is failure to update records, schedule Ranger terms or send out notifications promptly to members. We have allowed the Mayor five instances of dereliction of duty before Rangers might convene a Hearing to remove him/her from office. Dereliction of duty means that something which must be done has not been done and the Rangers must step in on an emergency basis and do it in the Mayor’s stead. As with the Rangers, however, the Mayor will never be considered derelict if advance warning of an absence is given.
(The addition to Article 5, which you will read below, is the procedure for Hearings to remove the Mayor if that becomes necessary.)
Other minor amendments to Article 4 include the filling in of a committee name that was not yet known when the article first went for ratification, and an additional constraint that the Mayor may not serve as a Ranger, Juror, Loremaster or Mediator while in office.
SUMMARY OF ADDITIONS AND AMENDMENTS TO ARTICLE 5: DISPUTE RESOLUTION IN THE OUTSIDE FORUM
The full text of the article, including those parts already ratified, can be read IN THIS POST.
Now that Article 4 is complete, we were able to add to Article 5 the Procedure for Hearings to Remove an Elected Official, ¶7.
As with Hearings to Remove A Ranger, the Mayor can only be removed from office for reasons specified in the Charter, and the Jury cannot impose variable penalties on a Mayor. They may only decide to remove or not remove him/her.
We have added the requirement that a Loremaster be in attendance for Hearings to Remove either a Ranger or the Mayor.
We have added statutes of limitations to ¶4: Hearings, ¶5: Hearings on a Ban, and ¶8: Appeals. If a Ranger spots a violation of by-laws, they must convene a Hearing within ten days or else forget about it. In the case of Immediate Bans (for ad spammers, etc), the member has [91 days][three months](See note) to request a reversal; after that the Rangers do not have to save the thread as evidence. A member that wishes to appeal a Jury decision must do so within [91 days][three months](See note) or before the penalty expires, whichever comes first.
[Note: the articles on which "91 days" is based say "three months," technically 91.5 days. If there are no objections we will round this up to 92 days instead of rounding down to 91. Further discussion suggests that it would be better to state 3 months than to translate this into days. ]
Followed by, "All timely requests for appeal must be heard ..."
These limitations were introduced because members can request that Hearing threads be deleted, and we did not want to delete them so soon that the case could not be appealed or bans could not be reversed. We also did not want belated action taken by Rangers against members.
We have also made a minor amendment so that date-last-served will be shown for Mediators on the list that appears in the Bike Racks.
In order to ratify these additions and amendments, 39 members must cast votes, and of those who vote, two-thirds (67%) must vote in favor.