[Sosfbay-discuss] Questions about Reboot Proposal

[JamBoi]

Dear Mike and Marilyn,

Former Co Coordinator of the C.C., Gerry Gras had the
following questions to ask about the 'Reboot'
proposal.  Can either or both of you respond?

Greens for an functional GPCA!

Drew Johnson
GPSCC delegate, working to build consensus for the
Reboot Proposal
______________________________________

From:	"Gerry Gras" <gerrygras at earthlink.net> 
To:	JamBoi at Greens.org
CC:	"scc" <sosfbay-discuss at cagreens.org>
Subject: Re: [Sosfbay-discuss] "Reboot the CC!" says
Green uniTEA Nonaligned Movement; Proposal for GA from
Bylaws Committee

<SNIP>

> TITLE: RESOLVING THE IMPASSE: 
> RECONSTITUTING THE GPCA COORDINATING COMMITTEE
> 
> PRESENTERS: Mike Wyman (mswyman at comcast.net),
> Marilyn Ditmanson (mditmanson at sbcglobal.net)
> 
> APPROVED BY: Green Party of Marin county council
> 
> BACKGROUND: 
> The GPCA Coordinating Committee (CC) has been
> deadlocked since October 2006. This is a result of
an
> ongoing conflict that goes back to 2001. Many hours
of
> meetings over the past 6 years have been rendered
> useless due to infighting around "the LA situation,"
> meaning which group from LA gets to vote on the CC.
> Proposals of mediation and compromise have only
> resulted in more infighting. The number of regions
> with contested seats has instead increased to 4. The
> result is that the CC is no longer able to perform
its
> main function of planning plenaries.
> 
> This proposal reconstitutes the CC with people who
are
> not and have not been involved in the party
> infighting, much as a professional committee in the
> business world will be reconstituted when unable to
do
> its work. It is
> reconstituted with representation more proportionate
> to
> membership, as California has promoted in the
national
> party.
> 
> Part of the CC deadlock has been caused by the chaos
> around the facilitation procedures for the CC. Using
> supermajority voting thresholds for facilitation
> decisions has resulted in the following situations:
> 
> * meetings being unable to be held at all, and no
> items even discussed in the interest of
> consensus-building, due to lack of 2/3 approval of
an
> agenda
> 
> * facilitators taking 45-minute stacks on whether to
> add 5 minutes to an item
> * long stretches of valuable meeting time wasted on
> discussions of whether to add an item to the agenda,
> alter the agenda or choose a new facilitator
> 
> * two different voting thresholds applying based
> solely on whether the vote itself is taken online or
> during a
> teleconference, allowing proposals to be subject to
> manipulations based on voting thresholds.
> 
> This proposal also clarifies basic facilitation
> procedures for GPCA coordinating committee (CC)
> meetings in order to avoid such situations. These
> facilitation procedures are based on two main
> premises:
> 1. The decision-making body has authority over its
> agenda.
> 2. Basic facilitation decisions, such as agenda
> approval, agenda amendment, and addition or
> subtraction of discussion time, are not intended to
> involve whole separate consensus processes and
stacks
> of clarifying questions, concerns and affirmations
on
> the facilitation decision. (Note that the
facilitation
> rules passed out at plenaries do not suggest this,
> either.)
> 
> This proposal is a combination of a variety of ideas
> for solving the CC's problems that have been brought
> forward over recent months. The presenters hope that
> adoption of this proposal will finally end the CC's
> infighting based on historical animosities and give
> the new CC a real opportunity to do its
> bylaws-mandated job.
> 
> PROPOSAL: 
> I.The General Assembly hereby reconstitutes the GPCA
> Coordinating Committee (CC)
> 
> a. All seats on the CC are vacant as of 30 days from
> the passage of this proposal.
> 
> b. Per Paragraph 7-1.2 of the GPCA bylaws, the GA
> shall
> allocate the 16 regional representative seats
> proportionally to the Green Party membership in each
> region. This calculation shall be performed by the
> outgoing Liaison to the Secretary of State (Larry
> Cafiero) according to the Method of Equal
Proportions
> described in the appendix to the GPCA bylaws.
> 
> c. All regions shall announce new elections to fill
> the
> regional representative seats as soon as possible.
> Regions must hold open, transparent elections with
at
> least 3 weeks notice distributed as widely as
possible
> in the region. Notice of upcoming regional
> representative vacancies shall be posted to the
county
> contacts list as soon as possible after passage of
> this proposal. Regions without alternate processes
may
> adopt temporary alternate processes for the purpose
of
> filling the seats in a timely manner.


Hmm, if I combine the above ...

- the CC will have 16 voting members out of 20 leaving
   after 30 days
- new members will only come in after the
proportionality
   is recomputed and announcements are made and 3
weeks
   go by after the announcements are made and
elections
   are held, practically speaking, there may be a lot
   of vacant seats for awhile


> 
> d. No one who has served on the CC, or who has
claimed
> to serve on the CC, as representative or alternate,
> over the course of the past 5 years, is eligible to
> run for or fill any representative or alternate seat
> on the CC for the next 2 years.


I wonder if you can find 16 people who are willing to
be on the CC that meet this condition.  Traditionally
the Regional Rep "elections" have not been very
contested.



> 
> e.Transitional term lengths shall be varied in order
> to stagger the ending dates. This depends on the new
> apportionment by the Liaison, but end dates of the
> transitional terms would be expected to fall as
> follows:
> 
> Even-Numbered Years
> 1 Emerald	January 2008
> 2 At-large 	spring GA 2008
> 1 San Francisco	May 2008
> 1 Silicon	June 2008
> 1 East Bay	July 2008
> 3 Los Angeles	November 2008
> 1 San Diego/Imperial	August 2008
> 1 ORSB	November 2008
> 
> Odd-Numbered Years
> 2 At-large	spring GA 2009
> 2 Central	May 2009
> 1 North Bay	May 2009
> 1 East Bay	July 2009
> 1 Monterey Bay	August 2009
> 1 Central Coast	August 2009
> 1 ORSB	November 2009


I wonder how this scedule has been determined.
And I suspect that some will question the motives
for this schedule.

I may have missed something, but it seems that this
proposal will kick the At-large Reps off and not
replace them.  Why?


> 
> II.CC Facilitation Guidelines GPCA CC meeting
> facilitation shall proceed according to the
following
> guidelines:
> 
> a.Proposals for CC meetings must be posted to the CC
> listserv at least one week in advance of a scheduled
> meeting.


It's about time.


> 
> b. CC meeting agendas shall be approved by the CC
> prior to or at the beginning of a meeting, with a
> simple majority threshold for approval. 
> 
> c. Changes in announced facilitation require a
simple
> majority threshold for approval.
> 
> d. Adding time to an agenda item or altering the
> approved agenda requires a simple majority approval
of
> the CC. 
> 
> e. Adding a last minute item that was not submitted
to
> the CC list one week prior to the meeting requires a
> 2/3 threshold.
> 
> f. The CC prefers to discuss decision items on
> teleconferences and at in-person meetings. If an
item
> is discussed at a meeting and scheduled for an
online
> vote, the threshold for that vote is the same as if
> the vote had occurred during the meeting (2/3 for
> regular meetings, 80% for a special meeting not
> scheduled at a prior meeting at least a week in
> advance). If an item goes to an online vote without
> being discussed at a meeting, it has an 80%
threshold.
> 
> g. Decisions may not be made after the regularly
> scheduled adjournment time of the meeting unless a
> majority (over half) decides to extend the call for
a
> specific amount of time. Decisions must then be made
> within the time of the approved extension.
> 
> h. Simple majority approval votes on basic
> facilitation decisions can be done by asking quickly
> for "ayes" and "nays," and only going to a roll call
> if approval is unclear.
> 
> i. The new CC is requested to hire a Secretary to
take
> thorough minutes of meetings, post them to the CC
> list, amend them according to posted corrections,
and
> post the final version to both the CC listserv and
the
> archive of minutes. The new CC shall draft a job
> description and hiring criteria for this position.


FYI, that job has been open for a long time with some
advertising and no takers.


> 
> j. The new CC shall form a schedule of its basic
tasks
> that follow from the GPCA bylaws and integrate this
> schedule with the 2-year GPCA work plan, when it is
> adopted.
> 
> TIMELINE: 
> Vacancies effective upon passage. Elections may take
> place starting 2 weeks after passage of this
proposal.


How can you have elections starting 2 weeks after?
If this means voting in 2 weeks, then that violates
the 3 week notification above.  If it means that
notifications happen after 2 weeks, then this would
seem to mean that voting would not happen for 5 weeks
which would mean at least 12 days with no regional
reps.


> Elected CC members may meet on teleconferences but
may
> not make any decisions until a quorum of 14 is
> achieved. 


In the past, the quorum was set at 2/3 of the filled
seats, so this would set the threshold higher if there
are empty seats.


> 
> RESOURCES:  Hiring a Secretary will require the CC
> budgeting funds for this.
> 



- Off hand the facilitation changes seem a good idea.

- One thing that has often been talked about, but
noone
   (that I know of) has ever followed through on, is
   an orientation process / booklet for new CC
members.

Gerry



___________________

JamBoi: Jammy, The Sacred Cow Slayer
The Green Parties' #1 Blogger
http://dailyJam.blogspot.com

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