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RE: voting membership rules




I guess there is nothing stopping you from taking a vote at a plenary
meeting to re-define the quorum for an upcoming interim...that way all of
the quorum problems go away.

Regards,
Tony

At 00:10 26/09/99 +0100, John Messenger wrote:
>Roger,
>
>A useful way to deal with the likely unquorateness of interims is to
>pre-authorise certain actions at the preceding plenary.  802.5 typically
>takes a plenary vote to begin a ballot, and then another vote stating that
>if a majority (sometimes 75%) of those voting at the interim meeting vote to
>send a subsequent draft out for ballot, then it should go out to ballot.
>We've used this to pre-authorise committee letter ballots and also
>forwarding to LMSC.  There are some instances of this in our minutes at
>http://www.8025.org/meetings/.
>
>Regards,
>	-- John
>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: owner-stds-802-sec@majordomo.ieee.org
>> [mailto:owner-stds-802-sec@majordomo.ieee.org]On Behalf Of Tony Jeffree
>> Sent: 24 September 1999 09:42
>> To: Roger B. Marks
>> Cc: stds-802-sec@ieee.org; SMarin@boschtelecominc.com;
>> louis.olsen@teligent.com
>> Subject: Re: voting membership rules
>>
>>
>>
>> Roger -
>>
>> Your message annotated, preceeded by >>
>>
>> Regards,
>> Tony
>>
>> At 23:56 23/09/99 -0600, Roger B. Marks wrote:
>> >
>> > Gentlemen:
>> >
>> > I am a rookie Working Group Chair in need of some advice.
>> >
>> > In constructing rules for 802.16, my greatest challenge is
>> voting rights. I
>> > simply can't decipher the 802 rules on this. Several of us spent over an
>> hour
>> > with Jim Carlo in Montreal without resolution. I've been
>> worried that I am
>> > overcomplicating the situation, but I have concluded that the
>> situation in
>> > inherently complicated.
>> >
>> > I have looked at some other WG rules and have not found a clearer
>> > explanation. I'd like to know more about how you interpret the
>> rules in your
>> > group.
>> >
>> > Here are the key 802 statements:
>> >>
>> >> "... Thereafter, voting membership in a Working Group is established by
>> >> participating in the meetings of the Working Group at two out
>> of the last
>> >> four Plenary sessions... Membership starts at the third Plenary session
>> >> attended by the participant. One duly constituted interim
>> Working Group or
>> >> task group meeting may be substituted for the Working Group
>> meetings at one
>> >> of the two Plenary sessions."
>> >
>> > "Membership is retained by participating in at least two of the
>> last four
>> > Plenary session meetings. One duly constituted interim Working
>> Group meeting
>> > may be substituted for one of the two Plenary meetings."
>>
>> >> One of the key statements that you have missed is that the
>> Chair also has
>> the power to grant membership as he/she sees fit.
>>
>> >> The rules are not entirely clear as to which meetings
>> constitute "the last
>> four".  When you are at a Plenary meeting, does that meeting
>> count as one of
>> "the last four"? or are they the four most recent (and completed)
>> plenaries?  I
>> believe that the correct interpretation is the latter.
>> (1) First let me put off the question of interims and make sure I
>> understand
>> the basic idea. I understood from Jim that lists are updated only in
>> conjunctions with plenaries, that new members are added at the
>> opening of the

>> plenary meeting, and that expired members are deleted at the end of the
>> plenary. I think that these statements follow from the rules.
>>
>> Here are a couple of simple scenarios and my interpretation of the rules:
>>
>> Meeting:     1  2  3  4  5  6  7  8  9
>> Attendance:  x  x  x  -  -  -  -  -  -    x=attendance
>> Status:            v         n            v=becomes voter;
>> n=becomes nonvoter
>>
>> >>I believe this is correct.
>>
>> Meeting:     1  2  3  4  5  6  7  8  9
>> Attendance:  x  x  x  -  -  x  -  -  -    x=attendance
>> Status:            v            n         v=becomes voter;
>> n=becomes nonvoter
>>
>> >>Correct.
>>
>> I think I understand everything to this point.
>>
>> Here's a slightly more interesting case:
>>
>> Meeting:     1  2  3  4  5  6  7  8  9
>> Attendance:  x  x  x  -  x  -  -  x  x    x=attendance
>> Status:            v            n    v    v=becomes voter;
>> n=becomes nonvoter
>>
>> Here someone loses voting rights after meeting 7 and regains them
>> in time for
>> meeting 9.
>>
>> >>Correct.
>>
>> One scenario that also follows from the rules is:
>>
>> Meeting:     1  2  3
>> Attendance:  x  x  -     x=attendance
>> Status:            v     v=becomes voter; n=becomes nonvoter
>>
>> In other words, you become a voting member at the third plenary
>> even if you
>> don't attend it. I think  the requirement that people petition
>> for membership
>> at the meeting is in conflict with this rule, so I don't plan to implement
>> this
>> petitioning requirement.
>>
>> >>Wrong.  The granting of membership occurs at the start of the
>> third plenary
>> attended (assuming the "last four" rule has been satisfied); so
>> in this case,
>> the individual will gain voting rights only on attendance at
>> plenary meeting 4
>> or 5.  This is clear from the first passage you quote.
>>
>> (2) Now we introduce the interim meetings, and things get trickier. The
>> problem
>> is that the rules don't specify WHICH interim meetings are eligible. For
>> example, if someone comes to an interim in 1981 and then turns up this
>> November, does he become a voter the next time he shows up at a Plenary? A
>> more
>> typical example is this: a guy comes to a March Plenary and a May
>> interim. Is
>> he a voter in July? Does this violate the clause that "Membership
>> starts at
>> the
>> third Plenary"? It seems to; you could establish voting membership from
>> scratch
>> in 4 months. How do you guys handle this?
>>
>> >>The substitution rule (you can substitute one interim for one of the
>> plenaries) is reasonably clear on this, but I agree, if there has
>> only ever
>> been 1 interim and that occurred in 1981, then there is the possibility of
>> mis-interpretation.  I believe that what the rule should clarify
>> here is that
>> the only interim attendances that can be substituted are the ones
>> that have
>> occurred during the time-period betweem now and the first of the last four
>> plenaries.  In other words, the test for gaining membership becomes:
>>
>> >>"If you are building membership, and you are attending a
>> plenary meeting,

>> and
>> you have either attended two out of the last four plenaries or
>> have attended
>> one of the last four plenaries plus one interim meeting that occurred in
>> between any two of the last four plenaries, then you have achieved voting
>> status."
>>
>> >>Similarly, for maintaining membership:
>>
>> >>"If you have either attended two out of the last four plenaries or have
>> attended one of the last four plenaries plus one interim meeting
>> that occurred
>> in between any two of the last four plenaries, then you have
>> maintained your
>> voting status."
>>
>> One of the rules I'm considering is allowing an interim to
>> substitute ONLY for
>> the preceding Plenary.  This would require a minimum of 6 months to gain
>> voting
>> rights. If I don't do this, I'll probably let the interim credit
>> be applied to
>> either the preceding or following Plenary but not to any other.
>>
>> >>I believe that is a tighter constraint than is currently
>> applied in other
>> WGs.
>>
>> (3) This is a comment, not a question: I think that the rules should be
>> revised
>> to take into account the existence of and importance of interim
>> meetings. Like
>> many other groups, we are planning three interims a year. People
>> can maintain
>> membership by attending two out of four plenaries, which is three meetings
>> every two years. Three out of twelve, in my opinion, is insufficient to
>> justify
>> continued voting rights.
>>
>> >>This seems at variance with your statement on substitution.  If
>> you believe
>> interims and plenaries are of equal importance, surely you should be
>> travelling
>> in the direction of giving equal credit for attendance at either.
>>  If you are
>> suggesting a "mininum time served" rule should be imposed, then
>> it would be
>> better separated from the meeting rule.
>>
>> The voting rights rule reduces the incentive for people to attend
>> interims. At
>> our interim last week, we ended up with less than a quorum. It
>> didn't hurt us
>> much, but it could in the future. For instance, my project plan
>> has us making
>> our key decisions at a May 2000 interim. If we don't have a
>> quorum, we could
>> have real problems.
>>
>> >>It is not unusual for interim meetings to be non-quorate; this
>> does not stop
>> the working group from functioning.  If decisions need to be
>> taken, then the
>> interim meeting's decisions can be ratified at the next plenary
>> (if the issue
>> can stand a 2 month delay) or ratified by email ballot (if more urgent).
>>
>> I'm getting off the topic, but I'd appreciate any advice on how I can keep
>> from
>> being completely hosed if I don't have a quorum. Right now, I
>> have two ideas:
>>
>> -Make decisions by letter ballot.
>> -Get the inactive voting members off the rolls by:
>>     -deleting members who fail to vote in letter ballots.
>>     -offering inactive members the option to resign.
>>     -ensuring that the rules are interpreted to delete inactive
>> members. See
>> (4) below:
>>
>> >>I don't see anything to prevent you doing all of the above.  But as
>> commented
>> earlier, non-quorate interims do not prevent work from being done.

>>
>> (4) For a new WG, 802 doesn't include any specific rules except that:
>> >
>> > "All persons participating in the initial meeting of the Working Group
>> become
>> > voting members of the Working Group."
>> > >>I believe as WG chair you have the right to define such a
>> rule if you see
>> > fit (see my comment above).
>>
>> Strictly interpreted, the rules says that my voting members (who
>> became so by
>> attending last July) will lose their voting rights at the end of
>> the November
>> plenary if they don't attend; they will not have attended two of the last
>> four.
>> Of course, there have only been two, but the rules don't provide
>> any kind of
>> allowance for that. One might say that one of two is enough,
>> given that there
>> have only _been_ two. However, I prefer the stricter interpretation and
>> plan to
>> use it. Note that people who lose voting rights after November
>> can regain it
>> fairly quickly:
>>
>> Meeting:     1  2  3  4
>> Attendance:  x  -  x  -      x=attendance
>> Status:      v   n    v      v=becomes voter; n=becomes nonvoter
>>
>> >>Not quite...I believe the strict interpretation is that he/she only
>> becomes a
>> voter at meeting 4 if he/she attends the meeting and it is a plenary (see
>> earlier).  But as this is a startup situation that is not handled by the
>> rules,
>> I guess you get to call the shots.  (Typical software bug
>> here...it handles
>> the
>> normal cases, but not the exceptions...)
>>
>>
>>
>>
>
> 
>