On Mon, Feb 25, 2013 at 10:50 AM, Thomas Dalton thomas.dalton@gmail.comwrote:
On Feb 25, 2013 9:41 AM, "James Alexander" jamesofur@gmail.com wrote:
Err .... ok, I'm sorry but this actually moves to the realms of scary.
You
require the new Council member to send in a statement ... pledging
loyalty
essentially? I don't see anything in the charter that would require something like that, is it in your remit as chair? Sadly that just sounds like a way to force out reformers, if you don't support the charter you can't join the council? How do you expect to get things to change when necessary?
I'm hoping that was just a poor choice of words and Fae doesn't mean they have to support the charter, just that they have to agree to follow the charter. If they do have to support the charter, then that is excessive and undesirable.
Probably this type of discussions over the meaning of technical English words after all, I hope that "supporting the Charter" includes supporting the part about amendments) and the fact that inviting chapters to become members was never really pursued more enthusiastically than stating that 1) becoming a member just takes "these easy steps" therefore 2) logically, every chapter can make the rational choice whether to join and if they haven't yet decided to join that is probably because they haven't had time to realize that this is the correct choice, probably "because they are not active or too busy with other things." At least, this was my personal perception at the time I was still a chapter board member; I fear that this model might not work in attracting new members (especially as the history to process is growing, so it makes more difficult to make an informed decision) and some more active and welcoming outreach might bring better results.
In that light, I think Jan Bart's suggestion to give voice to all chapters and set up structures that are open not only in principle but practice is a good idea. (Although, with that in mind, the choice of the chairperson - especially as he needs to be a council member - seems like an internal matter, so there might not be big benefits in extending the right to vote.)
Best regards, Bence