On Wed, Jun 27, 2012 at 4:03 PM, Thomas Dalton <thomas.dalton(a)gmail.com> wrote:
In what sense do these visitors have a "one-year
term" when they are
actually just attending one meeting?
In the sense that someone could attend any of the meetings happening
within that year, as agreed on by the board and the visitor. So if
someone is a visitor for 2011-12 they might attend any one of the 3-4
in-person meetings that will happen during that year. We probably
could have phrased that better but that is the intention.
And why doesn't the board just allow anyone that
wants to come along
to observe their meetings?
When we discussed the visitors program last year some of the arguments
against opening the meetings to all were, IIRC: maintaining
confidentiality, the potential distraction of having observers,
preserving the ability of the trustees to feel like they are able to
speak their minds, and logistics.
-- phoebe