[NSRCA-discussion] Proposed NSRCA Bylaw changes

[Scott McHarg]

I cannot answer for Jim or any other member on this board.  I do not know
why I tend to be the only one who answers and I apologize.  I feel that you
should always be informed at all times but some of the times, I don't have
the answers.  I try very hard to keep everyone informed.  I do however,
find it ironic that those minutes have been out there since July and no one
said boo until now.

I guess I need some clarification on what you said.. and why you would vote
no:

Article V, Section III:  This would change termination of membership from
one month to three months dues delinquency.  I see no reason for this
change, and would commit the club to keep mailing K-Factors to delinquent
members for two more months.  At a time when there is a lot of debate on
the board about the expense of the K-Factor, this makes no sense.
Recommend voting NO on this item.

I read that you don't want to change the delinquency from the end of
January to the end of March because you would just keep sending out
Kfactors anyway regardless of what the By-Laws state.  I read that you
don't think it needs to be in writing but yet we should do it all by the
book.  It's contradictory.  The whole purpose was to allow the Kfactor to
keep being sent to delinquent members until the end of March instead of the
end of January.  This extends the time for members to get their dues paid
instead of just being cut off.  All we are doing is putting in writing what
is already happening.  For the past 2 years, I kept sending Kfactors
through the March issue to hopefully get them to pay their dues and show
some empathy as it's not always easy to come up with funds to pay member
dues during Christmas time.  If we did it by the book, I shouldn't have
sent anything after the December issue.   As far as your last sentence, the
NSRCA currently pays for 500 copies and in order to get the "pre-sort"
postage from USPS, we must order 500.  Typically and depending on the
month, we actually mail out 250-450 copies since I've been doing this based
on the box that I receive as extras.  So, whether we continue to mail out
Kfactors for 1 month or 3 months, the cost does not change due to the fact
we have to pay for 500.  Actually, at the current way of doing the Kfactor,
the more we mail out, the more we save as the extras have to be shipped to
the Secretary.  So it actually does make sense as the cost does not change
aside from the box of extras that are shipped.

If I've misread what you intended, please help me to understand.  You have
a lot of knowledge Jon and I respect that a lot.  There is zero disrespect
intended here.


On Mon, Dec 3, 2012 at 10:28 AM, jonlowe at aol.com <jonlowe at aol.com> wrote:

> I asked Jim to publish the changes as well as rationale but he refused.
> Very opaque to the membership.
>
> I gave my reason for voting against the change in the dues grace period.
>  If you re-read it,  it is there.
>
> Jon
>
> ----- Reply message -----
> From: "Scott McHarg" <scmcharg at gmail.com>
> Date: Mon, Dec 3, 2012 11:14 am
> Subject: [NSRCA-discussion] Proposed NSRCA Bylaw changes
> To: "General pattern discussion" <nsrca-discussion at lists.nsrca.org>
>
> Gentlemen,
>    For clarification purposes only, Jon Lowe is incorrect about Article V
> Section III.  Currently, the By-Laws say that any member who is delinquent
> for one calendar month will automatically have their membership services
> terminated.  The change makes membership delinquency 3 months which allows
> us to continue sending Kfactors to individuals who may have forgotten to
> pay their dues in time.  The way it reads right now, Kfactors should be
> terminated along with affiliation at the end of January.  We have extended
> the grace period to 3 months (the end of March).  We were trying to give
> you more, not less.  I don't understand why he would recommend to vote no
> on this.  I would suggest comparing the ballots to the By-Laws and make
> your own decision instead of using minutes to decide what was intended.  As
> hurried as the meetings are, I admit, I make mistakes as I have to take all
> the information down quickly and make them into minutes.  This is exactly
> why you should wait until you receive the "official" changes instead of
> jumping to conclusions.  From what I saw that Jim was sending out, items
> are much more defined than in the minutes.
>
>
> On Mon, Dec 3, 2012 at 8:55 AM, Jon Lowe <jonlowe at aol.com> wrote:
>
>>  SInce the bylaw change ballots have now been sent out, in accordance
>> with the current bylaws, and since the NSRCA board has failed
>> to provide any rationale for the changes (if they are going to propose
>> changes, you'd think they'd own up to why they want to change them), I
>> thought I'd review the proposed changes here and provide comments.  Jim
>> Quinn said that we could either vote for or against the entire package, or
>> for individual items within the package.  I will review the changes item by
>> item, and provide what I think is the rationale for the change.  As you
>> will see below, I am recommending voting NO on several of the changes. I
>> have not seen the official ballot yet and won't until at least Wednesday
>> since I am out of town, so I am commenting on what was provided in the July
>> 22nd NSRCA Board minutes. Note that there were several typos in those
>> minutes, and that I have attempted to correct them where possible.
>>
>> Article II, Section I:  This would change the business address from the
>> Secretary to the Treasurer of the club.  This is probably ok, since bills
>> to the club are sent to the business address, and this could prevent delays
>> in payment.
>>
>> Article III, Section I:  This is part of the object and purpose of the
>> Society.  It would delete "...in all of its phases." from the second
>> sentence so it would now read:  "To aid, insofar as possible, the Academny
>> of Model Aeronautics and other AMA activites, to further the advancement of
>> model aircraft aerobatics."  This change appears to be a clarification
>> change, and should be ok.
>>
>> Article V, Section II(b):  This appears to clarify the dues payment, and
>> makes clear that dues should be made payable to NSRCA and not the
>> treasurer.  Appears to be ok.
>>
>> Article V, Section III:  This would change termination of membership from
>> one month to three months dues delinquency.  I see no reason for this
>> change, and would commit the club to keep mailing K-Factors to delinquent
>> members for two more months.  At a time when there is a lot of debate on
>> the board about the expense of the K-Factor, this makes no sense.
>> Recommend voting NO on this item.
>>
>> Article VIII, Section II (c): This change would remove the requirement to
>> mail out ballots, and changes the wording to allow whatever method the
>> board deems appropriate for voting, without specifying any method at all
>> for votes to be taken.  This change would also allow votes to be accepted
>> until 10 days after Dec 31st, IF they were mailed out to members.  This
>> change appears to be why the abortive attempt was made for an electronic
>> vote for officers this year, which disenfranchised many members who were
>> not aware a vote was being taken.  We do NOT require web access to be a
>> member of NSRCA, and until we do, we MUST allow for ALL members to vote on
>> officers of NSRCA.  Strongly recomment voting NO on this change.
>>
>> Article VIII, Section III (e):  This would change voting for District VPs
>> in the same manner as the method in Article VIII, Section II (c) above.
>> Strongly recommend voting NO.
>>
>> Article VIII, Section III (f): This change was listed as Article VII,
>> Section III (f) in the Board meeting minutes, which I believe was a typo.
>> This is a continuation of the change above to Article VIII, Section III(e)
>> on voting deadlines.  Strongly recommend voting NO.
>>
>> Article IX, Section I:  This removes some unnecessary wording from the
>> first paragraph of the Communications and Promotions portion of the
>> by-laws.  It appears to be a mistake made when this portion of the bylaws
>> was writen.  Appears to be ok.
>>
>> Article IX, Section II:  This would remove the requirement for the
>> K-Factor to be mailed to members.  It would have to be "made available to
>> all members", but doesn't say how.  SInce the proposed wording is unclear,
>> recommend voting NO on this change.
>>
>> Article IX, Section III (a):  This removes the requirement for a
>> Communications and Promotions manager appointed by the BOD, and changes
>> that responsibility to the BOD itself.  However, it does not assign that
>> responsibility to anyone on the board.  But it retains the provision for
>> the board to appoint someone to be that manager. As a result the paragraph
>> appears to contradict itself.  Recommend voting NO on this change since the
>> resulting language is ambiguous.
>>
>> Article IX, Section III (b):  This change changes says that the Board
>> "...shall appoint a Judging Program Manager."  It currently says "...should
>> appoint..."  This change appears to be ok.
>>
>> In summary, I believe that there are several problems with the proposed
>> changes, and recommend that you read them carefully and understand each of
>> the changes.  I'd recommend either voting NO to the whole package, or
>> voting against the specific changes I've outlined above.
>>
>> Thanks for reading.
>>
>> Jon Lowe
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>  Jon
>>
>> _______________________________________________
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>> NSRCA-discussion at lists.nsrca.org
>> http://lists.nsrca.org/mailman/listinfo/nsrca-discussion
>>
>
>
>
> --
> *Scott A. McHarg*
> Sr. Systems Engineer - Infrastructure
>
>
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> http://lists.nsrca.org/mailman/listinfo/nsrca-discussion
>



-- 
*Scott A. McHarg*
Sr. Systems Engineer - Infrastructure
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