At 11:41 AM 6/10/00 -0400, MrsGrinnin@aol.com wrote: >To any board members out there (Holly, Tina, Tim), I have some questions >regarding the upcoming election. I understand the renaming of the USGenWeb >Archives project, that's no biggie, but what about the recall and States >Rights issues. Don't understand what is to be accomplished with these, nor >the reasons behind them. Could one of you give us some insight into these >issues? Two very different issues <grin> I'm not going to insert the amendments themselves. For those who don't have the link to the amendments handy, they are posted at: http://www.usgenweb.org/official/amendments.html First, the recall amendment. I have absolutely no problem with the principle of recalling Board Members. I do have several problems with this amendment as it tacks in a few other items as well. Firstly, I don't think it is the business of a Recall Amendment to force the board to have a secretary. This portion could just as easily read that submission of petitions would be to the Board Secretary or if there was no Secretary, to <insert any specific Board Member such as the NC or their Regional representatives or whatever>. Although extremely detailed in other portions, there is no mechanism for what consitutes verification of the signers of a petition. The burden of counting signatures is left to the Board Secretary... why should it not be that the recall petition can ONLY be sent with the required number of verified signatures? The burden of the preliminary verification should be on the organizers of the petition, not to say that they shouldn't be verified after receipt. Secondly, the causes for recall are both vague and restricted... I know that sounds like a contradiction. The amendment states: "Reasons for recall are to be limited to: violation of bylaws, improper handling of information or legal/ethical violations." As we have all seen the bylaws are wide open to interpretation on several issues and points so whose judgement is it that a bylaw has been violated? What constitutes improper handling of information? *Improper* is a rather subjective judgement. What are legal and ethical violations? Especially the latter --- ethical I also have serious problems with voting simultaneously to recall someone and replacing them with someone else. Sounds efficient but it makes for a great waste of time and energy by potential replacements if the recall fails and confusing to the voters to try to decide both at the same time. Okay, so now I picked at the wording.... what's my opinion of this from my spot sitting in the thick of the mess? .... this is being set up as one more way to badger and bury the Board anytime some people don't get their way. We (the board) are all volunteers with county or other sites, personal lives etc... we are buried in frivolous grievances (yes some grievances have validity and many are resolved or dealt with on the regional level without having to stir the whole country up)... now we can be buried in recall petitions as well, hamstrung until they are resolved. As I said initially, I don't have any problem with the principle of recall (can I volunteer for recall???) ... it is this amendments wording and procedure I have serious problems with. Okay, this email has been long enough... I'll move on to the so-called States Rights amendment after a short break! Holly Timm USGenWeb Representative-At-Large