As part of the secretary report: Carl-Henry, Ester, and I had an on-again, off-again conversation over the pandemic about the annual meeting over zoom. There has also been a fair amount of discussion in the parliamentary law community (there are two international professional organizations, as well as the authorship teams of the leading manuals) about business transacted at virtual meetings during quarantine orders, whether permitted by the bylaws and statutory authorities or not. To summarize: transact the minimum required business, and ensure that voting is carried out by ballot if required. In my memory we haven’t had a contested election, so I wouldn’t think we’d start now. Most discussed systems: 1. Zoom has a polling function, but (a) it’s only for webinars, (b) hosts can’t vote, and (c) I don’t think it’s secret, although I don’t know. 2. Polys <https://polys.me/faq> seems good, but it limits to 100 participants unless you pay, and we couldn’t do that on the fly (“contact us for pricing”) 3. Lumi also has a “contact us for pricing” model Relevant bylaws summarized: 1. Only a ballot if an election is contested, otherwise voice vote or show of hands. 2. Other than the nominating committee, nominations may be made by 5 members, either before the meeting by mail or from the floor. 3. Quorum is whoever shows up. 4. No proxies. So: Recommendation 1: No business except the election, minutes, and reports. I don’t think we had anything planned anyway. Recommendation 2: I have a Polys poll ready to go but not sent out. When the meeting starts, I’ll check participants against the membership list and have that prepped to go out if need be. I would expect that to easily be under 100 participants. One question: we could either send out the slate from the nominating committee as normal with no notes, or specifically ask people that if they have other nominations to submit those before the meeting. I think we’d still have to have something more or less ready to go, but less pressure if not. Pat

I don’t follow the logic for no business other than elections. Everything else states that votes can be by voice or show of hands, so if there are business decisions to be made and we have a quorum of Council I see no reason why we can’t vote on such. Larry Meinert 128 F St. SE Washington DC 20003 413-320-5669 LDmeinert@gmail.com > On Oct 7, 2020, at 1:40 PM, Patrick Carr <patcarr@gmail.com> wrote: > > As part of the secretary report: > > Carl-Henry, Ester, and I had an on-again, off-again conversation over the pandemic about the annual meeting over zoom. There has also been a fair amount of discussion in the parliamentary law community (there are two international professional organizations, as well as the authorship teams of the leading manuals) about business transacted at virtual meetings during quarantine orders, whether permitted by the bylaws and statutory authorities or not. To summarize: transact the minimum required business, and ensure that voting is carried out by ballot if required. > > In my memory we haven’t had a contested election, so I wouldn’t think we’d start now. > > Most discussed systems: > > 1. Zoom has a polling function, but (a) it’s only for webinars, (b) hosts can’t vote, and (c) I don’t think it’s secret, although I don’t know. > 2. Polys <https://polys.me/faq> seems good, but it limits to 100 participants unless you pay, and we couldn’t do that on the fly (“contact us for pricing”) > 3. Lumi also has a “contact us for pricing” model > > Relevant bylaws summarized: > > 1. Only a ballot if an election is contested, otherwise voice vote or show of hands. > 2. Other than the nominating committee, nominations may be made by 5 members, either before the meeting by mail or from the floor. > 3. Quorum is whoever shows up. > 4. No proxies. > > So: > > Recommendation 1: No business except the election, minutes, and reports. I don’t think we had anything planned anyway. > > Recommendation 2: I have a Polys poll ready to go but not sent out. When the meeting starts, I’ll check participants against the membership list and have that prepped to go out if need be. I would expect that to easily be under 100 participants. > > One question: we could either send out the slate from the nominating committee as normal with no notes, or specifically ask people that if they have other nominations to submit those before the meeting. I think we’d still have to have something more or less ready to go, but less pressure if not. > > Pat > > _______________________________________________ > GSW-Councilplus-l mailing list > > The GSW Councilplus list serv intended for GSW Council members and GSW Committee Chairs to receive and post messages. > > GSW-Councilplus-l@minlists.org > http://lists.minlists.org/mailman/listinfo/gsw-councilplus-l