[Evergreen-governance-l] Basic rules of governance draft

[Dan Scott]

On Tue, Mar 01, 2011 at 10:45:20AM -0500, Amy Terlaga wrote:
> I think Galen's amendment is a very good idea.  I know that that was your
> general intent, Dan, but to state it explicitly right within the rules of
> governance seems like the way to go so that there isn't any
> misunderstanding.

Yep, I support both of Galen's amendments; I didn't respond immediately
because I was hoping for more people to weigh in (and thanks!). For the
"Transition" amendment, it just means that when we do achieve that
milestone that we'll have to amend the Rules of Governance again to
remove that clause, as it will no longer be pertinent, but that
shouldn't be a problem - just a housekeeping detail.
 
> I'm still reviewing it (and was about to make some suggestions then realized
> that what we're aiming for here is a basic structure that will be fleshed
> out later) - may have some comments after I've reviewed some more to make
> sure there's enough there to proceed without running into any significant
> gray area.
> 
> Oh, and since it's on my mind, I'm still hoping to work membership dues in
> at some point (won't be here - that's one topic that will bog us down again,
> I know)

Are you looking at adding the membership dues structure to the rules of
governance themselves? I have seen other governance documents (for
example, the Eclipse Foundation, which is an organization I have
participated in in the past) which separates the membership dues into a
separate document: "Each Member will pay dues as set forth in the
Membership Agreement, as amended from time-to-time by the Board." I
would recommend making the membership structure / fees / election
procedures part of the Rules of Governance 2.0 process as suggested in
Galen's amendment.

> For the Officers section, was the reason why we stayed clear of making the
> Vice-Chair the Chair-Elect the fear that we wouldn't get someone to commit
> for that long (whatever the term length turns out to be)?   In my past
> experience on Boards, transitioning between Chairs can be made smoother with
> that setup in place.

I have experienced that setup in other organizations, and have also
participated in successfully run organizations in which all of the
positions elected each term. I'm somewhat reluctant to go with the
automatic vice-to-chair transition approach out of the gate because it
seems premature to appoint someone for a position of leadership two (or
more, if you're suggesting that we might adopt something more than a
one-year term for officers) years down the road, when they haven't
proven their leadership abilities within the project or been elected to
their position by the members of the project.