AGA agenda for 3-13 teleconference

Dear Chapter Representatives and AGA Coordinators:

The Board of Directors will be holding a meeting by telephone conference call on Thursday, March 13. Our tentative agenda follows below. We invite your comments on any issues of interest to you. Please feel free to convey your comments to your regional representatives, or any other members of the Board.

Sincerely,
Dave Weimer
Chair, Board of Directors

Tentative Agenda for March 13, 2003 Meeting

1. Roll call
2. Acceptance of minutes from February 13 meeting.
3. Questions to President about Preliminary Budget and Progress in AGA Staffing
4. Foreign Chapters
   The President seeks advice from the Board on whether or not to develop policies for the participation of foreign chapters in the AGA. The Board may decide not to allow Chapters not geographically-based in the United States. Alternatively, the Board may agree in principle that foreign chapters may be allowed. In the latter case, the President would develop policies as to the duties and responsibilities of these chapters, including voting rights, and the procedures by which they would be recognized as AGA chapters.
   Motion on Foreign Chapters:
   • The Board accepts in principle the admission of chapters organized in countries other than the United States primarily for and by nationals of those countries, and it directs the President to propose specific policies for their inclusion in the AGA.
5. Receipt of recommendations of the election committee.
   Questions for Sam Zimmerman, Chair of the Election Committee, on protocol for next election.
6. Reconsideration of motion on open ballots proposed by John Stephenson (tabled February 13):
   • WHEREAS, the American Go Association (AGA) Articles and By-Laws call for annual elections to decide certain Board of Director positions;
   • WHEREAS, the current structure of member enfranchisement is accomplished indirectly through Chapter Representatives of record, who are expected to ascertain and vote the amalgamated will of their clubs' affiliated AGA members; and,
   • WHEREAS, the AGA strives to be a fair and transparent organization, with its leadership accountable to the membership;
   • NOW THEREFORE, BE IT MOVED THAT the President shall establish a standing Election Committee to oversee an unbiased and honest election process that facilitates all duly authorized Chapter Representatives to vote for Board of Director candidates in accordance with the AGA Articles and By-Laws; and,
   • FURTHER MOVED THAT, the President shall direct the Election Committee chairperson to devise and implement an open ballot system, such that bona fide Chapter Representatives' votes be publicly tallied, audited and published next to the Chapter Representative's name and club name, and be made part of the public record.
7. Consideration of motions by Jon Boley on committee procedures and Board participation:
   Motion One (Committee Decision Making):
   • WHEREAS, the AGA is a large organization with many standing committees;
   • WHEREAS, the Board is called upon to resolve contentious issues on occasion;
   • THEREFORE, it will be AGA policy that any committee follow Robert's Rules of Order upon the request of any member of that committee.
   Motion Two (Committee Records):
   • WHEREAS, it is necessary to maintain institutional memory of the organization;
   • THEREFORE, chairs of committees must file minutes with the Secretary of the AGA for any meetings that make major decisions. Any member of the committee can request the keeping of minutes.
   Motion Three (Board Participation in Committees - Voting):
   • WHEREAS, Board members serving on committees are heavily invested in the decisions of the committees;
   • WHEREAS, Board members, by the nature of their position, may carry undue weight on such committees;
   • THEREFORE, Board members shall recuse themselves from voting on motions related to recommendations from the committees on which they serve.
   Motion Four (Board Participation in Committees - Chairing) :
   • WHEREAS, Board members, by the nature of their position, may carry undue weight on a committee to which they belong;
   • THEREFORE, Board members shall not chair committees.
8. Report by Bob O'Malley on status of mission statement and open discussion on long term goals of the AGA
9. Adjourn

Dear fellow chapter reps:

The board agenda for their monthly meeting March 13 was sent out a few days ago, hopefully you've had some time to look it over.

One issue affects us directly as chapter reps: that of open ballot.

The motion will be voted on that in board elections where board members are elected, ballots should be open and public. This means it wil be public knowledge who voted for whom.

I'm finding myself feeling strongly enough about this issue to write this note and to encourage you to contact your board reps before March 13 to let them know your feelings also. We've been asked for our input - let's give it.

I'm not assuming everyone feels the same way as myself, but I find the idea of public voting problematic.

We're a pretty small organization, everyone mostly knows everyone. It's important we all have a sense of shared support and unity. The potential for hard feelings coming up when any candidate, winner or loser, can see who voted for them and who didn't seems like a package of divisiveness.

It could also create problems for chapter reps, needing support from their board reps, to deal with them over the course of their terms if they didn't vote for them. There's also the issue that a good friend might be running for office, yet for whatever reason, you might not want to vote for them. Perhaps someone else seems more qualified. There's any number of reasons why most democracies choose the private ballot system.

I guess the reason this has come up is so that reps will be accountable to their club's wishes. This is an issue best handled within a club. Most of us work hard organizing club meetings and events. We depend on the support of our members , and good personal relations are necessary for a number of reasons. I doubt that member mis-trust of their reps is much of an issue, but if it is, it should be handled personally and directly at club meetings, not at the national board level.

If you've read this far, thanks so much for your time and consideration. My best to everyone,

Susan Weir [AGA Secretary]

here's the email list of the board members:

AT LARGE : Dave Weimer : Weimer@lafollette.wisc.edu

WESTERN REGION: Jon Boley : jon@airsltd.com
Bob O?Malley : omalley@coas.oregonstate.edu
omalley@pigeon.shipops.orst.edu

CENTRAL REGION:
David Dinhofer : ddinhofer@msn.com
Harold Lloyd : hlloyd@core.com

EASTERN REGION: Chendao Lin : cdlin5@yahoo.com
John Stephenson : john.stephenson@us.ibm.com
jcs@wingsgoclub.org

AGA Chapter Reps,

As I've made it fairly clear to my fellow copatriots in the Eastern Region, I'm a supporter of direct elections for board members, but this is something I will save for another day. More applicable to the issue at hand - I'm an advocate of the Semi-Closed system when dealing with representative voting in the board member election.

In essence, Semi-Closed grants the representative the privacy desired to avoid open conflicts - while still providing accountability to the members of each chapter. Furthermore, is also an entirely voluntary process. If certain chapters do not wish to change the status quo and participate in the Semi-Closed system, they can submit their vote in such a way as to have exactly the same effect as in a Closed system.

The Semi-Closed works as follows: everything is the same as the current system, except each chapter will submit some secret randomly generated five digit number along with their vote. When the vote is being tallied by the AGA, the number attached to each vote is recorded along with the vote. If for whatever reason, a vote is submitted without an accompanying number, a randomly generated five digit number will be assigned and used. At the end of the election, this list of random numbers along with accompanying vote can be published. In this way, we protect both the personal interests of the chapter members as well as the unity of the AGA.

I feel Semi-Closed provides the right amount of accountability to our AGA members: a way to know for certain that their Chapter reps is doing as he says he will, while working to preserve unity within the organization by avoiding the potential of creating openly hostile camps. In my opinion, the best of both world is encompassed in the Semi-Closed system. In my eyes, the choice is clear. Accountability and unity can and should go hand in hand.

---
Best regards,
Benjamin Tsai

Vice-President, Pittsburgh Go Association

Susan:

Well said!

Milt

--
"Better To Light One Small Candle Than To Curse The Darkness"
visit my web page @ http://newyork.villageworld.com/users/bradleym

Susan Weir wrote:

> Dear fellow chapter reps:
> The board agenda for their monthly meeting March 13 was sent out a
> few days ago, hopefully you've had some time to look it over.
> One issue affects us directly as chapter reps: that of open ballot.

[... edited for space ...]

[... edited for space ...]

Excellent points, Susan.

I'd like to add that while I think members should be allowed to vote anonymously, our ELECTED leaders should have their votes on BOARD ISSUES made public. They should be accountable to the membership, not the other way around.

Cheers,
Jeff Shaevel
Austin Go Club

I am forwarding, with slight modification, a post that I made in response to an extended discussion of this on the Eastern Region email list.

Essentially, I agree with Susan that if chapter voting must remain, it should be closed, but the real motion I'd like to see is a change to full-member direct voting. See arguments below.

Dramatis personae:

• John - John Stephenson, AGA director   [Actually John Goon? see below]
• Rob - Rob Muldowney, Highland Park club
• Joe - Joe Berry, Games Galore club
• Keith - Keith Arnold, Baltimore club
• hlime81 - also Keith
• poll - A Yahoo poll arranged by John for the Eastern Region on the open/closed topic

(Enter John, with poll asking the wrong questions)

I've been following this with interest. I have not added my vote to John's poll, because none of the options reflect my views accurately. So I, um, abstain... from that issue, not the real one, which is direct full-member voting replacing chapter voting.

John sez:

> 1. As Chapter Reps, we should be unequivocably accountable and
>open facing to our constituency of affiliated membership, and
> 2. The organization should run transparently as a matter of best
>practice.

Yep, sounds great, I like apple pie too. However, there is a logical fallacy in forcing open chapter voting. If we reduce the chapter rep's vote to an effective net poll of the chapter's members, how is that different from a clumsy, inaccurate implementation of direct voting? So why not have direct voting in the first place?

OTOH, if we expect the chapter rep, as one who "rows the boat", to exercise his or her best individual judgement, then the minor flamewar here between Keith and John exemplifies what is worst about open voting. You can't have it both ways. I agee with Joe that it will lead to a disincentive to vote and an increase in abstentions.

Rob is correct that the Electoral College, in its original form, is a good model, but modern electors are tightly bound to the popular vote. Do we have an equivalent "states' rights" issue? Does chapter voting somehow prevent big chapters from riding roughshod over small ones? I don't think so, the way we have it structured. Truly small chapters have no representation at all. Most have one vote; it's fairly difficult, outside the major urban areas, to get more than 15 full members. Look at what happened in New Jersey; as more players appeared, new clubs sprang up so people didn't have to drive as far to a club meeting.

The other thing we're forgetting is that most chapter reps aren't elected. They are simply the local players who are willing to do the organizing and maintenance of a club. And although they do indeed help "row the boat", they are only a subset of those active in the AGA. Why shouldn't Chuck Robbins and Sam Zimmerman, for example, each have their own vote? How about Paul Matthews and me? It's an arbitrary accident where the active people are. Another obvious anomaly is a club like Wings, which is (AFAIK) the largest voting entity in the AGA. All Keith's impassioned appeal to over-the-board club play doesn't apply to Wings; it has lots of people who join with no geographical connection whatever. Any club which runs a major tournament, like the New Jersey Open, will have members we never see from one year to the next. If they join the AGA at the NJO, voila, they're Princeton members. I don't know their opinions in the way Keith claims; I never see them. I couldn't even name them all without looking them up. Why should I represent them to the AGA?

So while I agree with Keith that clubs are a vital and necessary part of the AGA, I don't think their effectiveness depends on reserving voting power to chapters. I think most people prefer playing face to face if they can without extraordinary inconvenience, so I'm one who believes the net is ultimately favorable to clubs because it brings more people to the game.

So to wrap up, here's how I rate the choices:

1) Direct voting. I think Keith underestimates the intelligence and perception of those interested in the AGA's future if he fears that a "slick campaign" will cause someone terrible to win out over someone he knows. If somebody wins because they had better written materials, that's not so bad; communications skills are a very important part of the job.

AGA members who don't know or don't care, won't vote. Those who do are competent to choose their board representatives. I don't know any chapter head who is motivated to be one by the authority to vote, nor anyone who joins a club in order to participate in AGA governance. They join to play Go.

2) Closed chapter voting, as now. If you're giving power to the chapter heads, leave it there. If they are the electorate, don't try to kluge it into being a half-assed popular voting mechanism.

3) Open chapter voting. Terrible. No upside, because anybody who cares how their chapter rep voted can just ask him/her. Plenty of downside, for all the reasons others have brought up and just plain aggravation potential for the chapter rep.

Later, "hlime81 " wrote:
(discussing member referendum on new bylaws, which retained chapter voting)
> new bylaws were proposed, retaining Chapter
> voting and this was approved by THE MEMBERSHIP AS A WHOLE. Now, in
> fairness, many voters may have liked the new system even though they
> would have preferred popular election.

Bingo. My position is the latter.

Rick Mott, Princeton Go Club

I concur.
--John Hogan
Seattle Go Center Chap. Rep.
----- Original Message -----
From: "Susan Weir" <susan@weirdolls.com>
Sent: Monday, March 10, 2003 9:58 AM
Subject: Open ballot issue

Dear fellow chapter reps:
The board agenda for their monthly meeting March 13 was sent out a
few days ago, hopefully you've had some time to look it over.
One issue affects us directly as chapter reps: that of open ballot.

[... edited for space ...]

[... edited for space ...]

I agree with Rick that direct elections would be beneficial because it solves the problem of those of us who don't get a voice at all because we belong to small clubs (less than 5 AGA members). It seems to me that giving people who currently have no voice a say in AGA matters increases their interest in the AGA and everyone benefits from this.

Steve Rich
Waco Go Club
(2 AGA members)

P.S. I'm not even sure why I am on this list. I am (as Rick says) the one who was "willing to do the organizing and maintenance of a club". But we only have 2 members who are also AGA members so I can't vote as a chapter representative or as an individual member of the AGA. (We do have a 3rd member who has been coming regularly for a couple of months now. I've loaned him the club's copy of the most recent American Go Journal to encourage him to get a copy of his own by joining the AGA. But even if he joins the AGA, he still won't have a voice in AGA matters since our club will still be too small to matter).

----- Original Message -----
From: "Rick Mott" <rickmott@alumni.princeton.edu>
Sent: Tuesday, March 11, 2003 10:15 AM
Subject: Re: Open ballot issue

[... edited for space ...]

[... edited for space ...]

I just would like to point out that I was not advocating a structure like the Electoral College. I was using it as an example where there is open knowlege of the votes or representative. This was after a challege to my original example of the House and Senate.

I prefer anonymous member voting. If representative voting is retained, I would prefer open voting or partial open (partial closed) voting.

Although I think there have been some good points made as far as closed voting goes, I still think we would have a stronger organization with open voting. The votes are considered from the chapter , not the representative so should not be take as a personal vote of no confidence.

Rob Muldowney

[quoting from Rick Mott's letter of 2003-03-11 above]
> Rob is correct that the Electoral College, in its
> original form, is a
> good model, but modern electors are tightly bound to
> the popular
> vote. Do we have an equivalent "states' rights"
> issue? Does chapter
> voting somehow prevent big chapters from riding
> roughshod over
> small ones? I don't think so, the way we have it
> structured. Truly
> small chapters have no representation at all. Most
> have one vote;
> it's fairly difficult, outside the major urban
> areas, to get more than
> 15 full members. Look at what happened in New
> Jersey; as more
> players appeared, new clubs sprang up so people
> didn't have to
> drive as far to a club meeting.
>

[Rick Mott is apparently responding to an off-list email from John Goon, AGA Community Outreach Coordinator and successful go club organizer in the Washington D.C. area.]

> Please distinquish between John Stephenson and John Goon ...

Yes, sorry.

>
> Proponents of the closed ballot system insist that this is needed to
> maintain the peace and harmony of the organization. That we may be
> sacrificing a degree of accountability, but that is inconsequential
> since there is no documented evidence of chapter rep abuse. ...
>
> There is actually a lot going on underneath the surface and it's not
> pretty.

Not quite the position I was aiming for. We speak of accountability, which is appropriate in elected officials or those with fiduciary responsibility, but I was not elected to be chapter rep by anyone and my fiduciary duties consist of sending in the chapter dues (which I pay, since we've never had club dues). Why, philosophically, should I be held accountable? I say this not out of some power-crazed impulse to impose my will on the helpless populace of the Princeton Go club, but to point out that the current arrangement is really not suitable for the kind of organization I think we want to grow into.

With the exception of Keith Arnold, who believes that chapter voting strengthens clubs, I haven't heard a cogent argument in favor of chapter voting. I've just heard a lot of "well, we don't want to deal with that now". But the time to deal with it is before the next election for directors happens.

I agree with you that personality issues are inevitable, which is part of why I'm uneasy with open balloting, but the main issue for me is that I don't *want* to be responsible for anyone's opinion but my own. Am I the only one who feels that way here?

I think a referendum should be posted on the members' E-Journal list to get a sense of the membership on the question of direct vs. chapter voting. There must be some way to stick in two links, one for direct and one for chapter, and count unique email addresses responding to each. It wouldn't be binding on the board, but it should certainly be informative.

Rick Mott, Princeton Go Club

Hello all,

I have been thinking about this issue for a while and am having difficulty deciding where I would stand on it. You could definitely put me in the camp of those who voted to accept the new AGA bylaws since I thought they were an improvement over what came before while believing that it was a mistake to not implement direct member voting for our representatives.

I might not have much weight in these matters, since I'm pretty new to the AGA organization and don't know all of the history and politics of past decisions, but I don't see the overriding advantages of restricting voting rights to the clubs alone. I understand that it is intended to promote club membership and growth, however, I don't believe you would find many people who join clubs so that they can have a vote (which they can't really have unless they are the club rep anyway). The vast majority, in my opinion, attend local clubs because playing by themselves on computers leaves them cold and unsatisfied. I haven't researched the AGA membership list to back this up, but I would imagine there are many AGA members who are not members of any official club. These members remain unrepresented and lack a voice under the current voting scheme.

Philosophically, I prefer the open vote for chapter reps. And since the votes of the chapter reps are supposed to be representative of a group decision of the entire club membership, there shouldn't be a fear of making public what the group decision was. Realistically, if chapter reps are making solo decisions on their votes, it is a problem of the chapter membership being too passive and abdicating their responsibilities in good AGA citizenship.

Of course, we are a small organization, so open voting will inevitably cause conflict, since the voters and those running for office are all human beings and will have ongoing interaction with each other. In the real world, open voting may cause more problems than it fixes. However, just keeping the voting closed will not eliminate the conflicts. They will just remain below the surface, simmering away, only to be seen occasionally. I guess I would come down on the side of continuing the closed voting since I know my own personality and I am uncomfortable with personal conflicts.

In the long run, I think the resolution comes in giving everyone the right of a private individual vote. Then, if someone doesn't like how things are being run, they can run for office, convince a majority of the membership they are right, and then lead some changes.

Anyway, sorry about the convoluted thinking, but it is getting pretty late here,

Todd Heidenreich
Montgomery Village, MD
Arthur Lewis Go Club
Rockville Chess and Go Group

Jeff;

that's a good point. I know the board is working on having the minutes of meetings posted on the web site. Is it possible to include vote tallies? Seems like it would be helpful to know for future elections.

Susan

On Tuesday, March 11, 2003, at 12:47 PM, Jeff Shaevel wrote:

> Excellent points, Susan.
>
> I'd like to add that while I think members should be allowed to vote
> anonymously, our ELECTED leaders should have their votes on BOARD
> ISSUES made public. They should be accountable to the membership, not
> the other way around.
>
> Cheers,
> Jeff Shaevel
> Austin Go Club
>

Does this list have any function other than to discuss internal politics?

And if it doesn't, could I please be removed from it?

yours,

Chris Aylott

I second your motion, Rick.

jean

--
Jean G. DeMaiffe, MSW
jean@dougandjean.com

[I am not sure, but I think Jean is supporting Rick's proposal to poll the members' E-Journal list about direct voting vs. chapter voting.]

[... edited for space ...]

[... edited for space ...]

Regarding the suggested referendum:

The Board has no say in this matter. Chapter voting is mandated in the bylaws. To change, we would have to amend them, and that must be done by a direct vote of the membership. There are many arguments for each approach, most of which are strong and worthy. The governance committee which wrote the new bylaws was also divided on this issue, but in the end decided that the structural changes being made were enough change for one time, and left this issue to be decided by itself at a later time.

The bylaws provide the requirements to amend them (2/3 approval by a mail ballot to the membership.) but no specific method for initiation of an amendment ballot process. I would imagine that the right approach, if one is sufficiently interested, is to approach your regional representative, and/or the at-large representative on the Board to suggest that an amendment be written for submission to the membership. Another approach might be to raise the question at the National Chapter Assembly meeting at the Congress. To do this you should get a number of people to contact me asking that the issue be placed on the agenda. I would also consult with the Board on this issue, so it is probably best to work both ends.

Best,

Chris Kirschner
-----------------------------------------------------------
President, American Go Association
Phone: 206-200-5764 Fax: 425-806-0250
Home: 425-806-0250 Seattle Local 206-579-8071
----- Original Message -----
From: "Rick Mott"
Sent: Tuesday, March 11, 2003 2:42 PM
Subject: Re: [AGAEasternRegion] Re: Voting and Ballots

[... edited for space ...]

> Rick Mott, Princeton Go Club

Full text of Rick Mott's letter quoted by Chris Kirschner

Chris Kirschner wrote:

> Regarding the suggested referendum:
> The Board has no say in this matter. Chapter voting
> is mandated in the bylaws.

Sorry, I'm not a parliamentarian; I should have used the word "poll" rather than "referendum", which has a legislative meaning. I realize the bylaws would have to be amended.

However, doing a mass mailing and tabulating the results would be a significant expense and effort. It would be nice to have an inexpensive read on whether enough members care about making the change to justify that.

I will volunteer to do the following, if you and the board are amenable to the idea:

1) Set up an email address for inclusion in the E-Journal, to which members may sent poll responses on whether they would prefer direct vs. chapter voting.

2) Prepare a summary of the points argued in the recent email discussions for posting on the governance portion of the AGA website, so interested members may educate themselves about the issue before responding. I would pass this by the main participants for review, to make sure I'm not misrepresenting anyone's ideas.

3) Tabulate the results and submit them to you and the Board.

Since I have no way to distinguish who's a full member, we'd get a number of invalid responses this way, but my guess is that responses from E-Journal subscribers won't differ radically from what you might get from a poll of full members only. Unless something close to the required 2/3 majority favors the change, the AGA need not incur the expense of a formal mailing to the membership.

I'm leaving for Florida in a week, so I would not be able to start this until mid-April. However, it should be feasible to expect to have a result by the end of May.

Rick Mott, Princeton Go Club

Just back from a trip and jumping in here after the fact, I guess, but it seems to me we're debating the issues out of sequence.

As far as I can determine, the AGA has no rules about how chapters are structured, so in one chapter the rep may be self appointed while in another she may be elected, and everything in between. In some chapters, it's the person who cares enough about AGA to pay the dues (that was me for the first three years of my club). In others, it sounds like there is a handful of activists who share the duties and also somehow decide the vote (that's how my club does it now).

I wonder if the AGA should not first define what a chapter is and establish some basic guidelines for how a chapter should be governed -- including such basic questions as chapter dues and how they relate to AGA dues, how chapter leaders are to be selected, etc. -- before we can proceed to determine how we vote for our regional and national leaders.

I believe that as long as the AGA leaves questions of chapter governance up to each chapter, the national should not dictate how each chapter should vote. And, in my opinion, until we have grass roots democracy (i.e., at the chapter level), we cannot have national board members elected by direct, popular vote.

That said, I agree that under the current arrangement (i.e., AGA is virtually silent on chapter governance) chapter reps should vote 100% secretly (non-publicly) while board members' votes should be 100% public. I think this would mean that those chapters where the rep and the members have by their own devices created some democratic processes can be as open as they wish internally about how their reps cast the chapter's vote(s), while in those where the rep is the person who does the work and there is no democratic process the rep (or the core group of activists) will vote according to her/his/their conscience.

Final note: Bravo to Susan Weir for initiating this vital discussion and to all of you who joined in prior to the Board vote on direct elections. Sorry I'm so tardy.

David E. Whiteside
Founder, President, Chapter Rep, and Most Equal of The Ruling Junta
Evanston Go Club, a Chapter of the American Go Association

"David E. Whiteside" wrote:

> I believe that as long as the AGA leaves questions of chapter governance up
> to each chapter, the national should not dictate how each chapter should
> vote. And, in my opinion, until we have grass roots democracy (i.e., at the
> chapter level), we cannot have national board members elected by direct,
> popular vote.

I agree with your arguments, but feel that they imply the opposite conclusion. That is, *because* there is no well-defined mechanism for selecting a chapter rep, it makes more sense to me to allow members to vote directly.

I think it would be difficult, and possibly even not appropriate, to define an official chapter structure which fits all cases. We have chapters consisting of the only two players for 50 miles, Net-based chapters with no geographical connections, and everything in between. We have a funny rule that says 5 full members get one vote, but it take 15 full members to get two votes. But nothing prevents a 10-member chapter from splitting into two 5-member voting chapters if its members cared deeply enough. So if you want to think of it that way, there's a perverse incentive to fragment moderately sized chapters. All of this weirdness vanishes with direct balloting.

Rick Mott, Princeton Go Club

Why should the national organization try to impose its will on local chapters by mandating structures and accountability? Seems like a great opportunity for the Law of Unintended Consequences to come into play.

As has often been pointed out here, members who are unhappy with their chapter are free to assert themselves, or form a different chapter. Are there members out there who need protection from their totalitarian chapter heads, or is this a solution in search of a problem?

BTW, the "funny rule" Rick mentions -- 5 members for the first vote, 10 for each additional vote -- was adopted to compensate for the natural advantage large chapters have in a vote, by giving a little more say to the smaller chapters.

Roy

----- Original Message -----
From: "Rick Mott" <rickmott@alumni.princeton.edu>
Sent: Wednesday, March 19, 2003 10:12 AM
Subject: Re: Open ballot issue

> "David E. Whiteside" wrote:
>
> > I believe that as long as the AGA leaves questions of chapter governance up
> > to each chapter, the national should not dictate how each chapter should
> > vote. And, in my opinion, until we have grass roots democracy (i.e., at the
> > chapter level), we cannot have national board members elected by direct,
> > popular vote.
> >
>
> I agree with your arguments, but feel that they imply the opposite
> conclusion. That is, *because* there is no well-defined mechanism
> for selecting a chapter rep, it makes more sense to me to allow
> members to vote directly.
>
> I think it would be difficult, and possibly even not appropriate,
> to define an official chapter structure which fits all cases. We have
> chapters consisting of the only two players for 50 miles, Net-based
> chapters with no geographical connections, and everything in
> between. We have a funny rule that says 5 full members get one
> vote, but it take 15 full members to get two votes.
> But nothing prevents a 10-member chapter from splitting
> into two 5-member voting chapters if its members cared
> deeply enough. So if you want to think of it that way, there's
> a perverse incentive to fragment moderately sized chapters.
> All of this weirdness vanishes with direct balloting.
>
>
> Rick Mott, Princeton Go Club

All:

I was rather indifferent to this burgeoning controversy as rather like "a tempest in a teapot", but Roy's statement that

"BTW, the "funny rule" Rick mentions -- 5 members for the first vote, 10 for each additional vote -- was adopted to compensate for the natural advantage large chapters have in a vote, by giving a little more say to the smaller chapters."

Milt

--
"Better To Light One Small Candle Than To Curse The Darkness"
visit my web page @ http://newyork.villageworld.com/users/bradleym

Roy Laird wrote:

Why should the national organization try to impose its will on local chapters by mandating structures and accountability? Seems like a great opportunity for the Law of Unintended Consequences to come into play.

[... edited for space ...]

begun 2003-03-11
2003-03-11 - added Shaevel, Mott, Hogan, Rich, Muldowney
2003-03-12 - added Mott #2, Heidenreich, Weir #2, Aylott, DeMaiffe
2003-03-15 - added Kirschner, Mott #3
2003-04-07 - moved to agej/2003
2003-04-08 - added Whiteside, Mott #4, Laird, Bradley