Members

Holly Rocke   on Monday 06/22/2020 at 06:42 PM

The minutes will still need to be posted to the website even if this motion fails. So this is setting a deadline of when it should be posted. I am opposed to this motion. Five days is an arbitrary length of time, and does not allow the Secretary and the office to prioritize work. This seems more of a policy rather than a member resolution. I am speaking as a member and not a representative of the Board

Claire Creese - RBC   on Thursday 06/25/2020 at 09:39 AM

Thank you, Holly, for stating your position and raising your concern.

To confirm,’publication’ means posting the Board minutes on the Board page. This is AmSAT’s practice and since its founding Board minutes (other than the now ceased practice of taking executive session minutes) have always been made available to the membership.

The Board page is currently up to date with all minutes posted. We are delighted to acknowledge these postings prior to AGMs. The focus of the motion, however, is what goes on throughout the year.

Having observed when minutes are posted from serving on the Board, it is clear that frequent and considerable delays occur irrespective of individuals’ roles and irrespective of the administrative system in place at any one time. These delays are a long-standing institutional pattern. Those familiar with the often intense nature of the organization’s annual work cycle will appreciate the assorted pressures mitigating against the routine task of posting minutes.

Equally, over the years, well intended commitments and promises have been made to resolve the problem. In 2013 a similar AGM motion was withdrawn in good part because of the assurance that minutes would be posted within 10 working days of approval. More recently, similar promises have been made to address logistics. But posting minutes remains amongst the lowest, and possibly the lowest, priority.

As the first whereas clause indicates, this pattern is not serving AmSAT in the long run.
In a member organization, effective transparency and agency are related to information being made available in a timely manner. And the ongoing work of our committees, and of increasingly collaborative inter-committee work, requires access to the latest approved decisions, policies and documents.

Granted, because there is no explanation for the 5 business days in the motion, the latter may appear to be, but was not in fact, arbitrary. Five days suggests that the most efficient time frame for parties to work on minutes is when the meeting is fresh in mind. Given the speed and email volume being dealt with, come 2 weeks after the meeting and memories fade.

Members may - and regularly do - take up varied items of AmSAT business via member resolutions (which may be described as ‘policy’ or other.)

There are technical matters around the production of minutes that the motion does not address. But for clarity’s sake, it is worth explaining that the Board usually approves what may be called a skeletal version of the minutes. This is a version in which supporting documents are usually linked (i.e., where supporting text - which may include newly approved or newly amended policy documents - is not fully textually integrated).

If the Board were to approve a fully presented Word version of the minutes to include all the text from the relevant supporting documents, then the matter of the time allocated to getting the minutes ready for posting in a pdf version - which is where the hold up is occuring - could cease to be an issue. It would then only be a matter of converting a Word document into a pdf which could be posted within 5 business days.

Ruth Rootberg   on Friday 06/26/2020 at 12:56 PM

Thanks to both Holly and Claire for your comments. I am in agreement with Holly that this is a Board Policy issue and not something the membership need decide, and therefore am against this motion.

I do recognize how AmSAT will benefit from more timely web publication of the minutes, but as it forces the hand of a volunteer Secretary and a paid association management company, it's difficult to know what the repercussions will be if this motion passes as is but there is no compliance.

Claire's suggestion that minutes be completed while still fresh is of course a good idea, but I don't know that insistence with a membership resolution is the way to go.

Claire Creese RBC   on Saturday 06/27/2020 at 04:02 AM

Thank you, Ruth. We take your points and recognize that the Board is the day-to-day steward of AmSAT’s resources, financial and volunteer. We understand the matter in general should not need to come to the membership at an AGM and do so reluctantly. The question has been rumbling on for years, however, to no effect. And it was time for the membership to be made aware of the situation, one taking up volunteer time behind the scenes; causing confusions, more committee emails, delayed reports etc. It would be a better use of everyone’s time and efforts to be able to simply consult the website.

RB Committee members have first-hand experience of the rhythm of work in AmSAT’s annual cycle and know that volunteers and contracted management need to focus on particular projects at different times during the year. There is also a question about whether adequate and appropriate resources have been allocated to meet members’ needs for access to current organizational information.

Whatever the solution, the fact is that generating AmSAT minutes takes time, volunteer and contracted. And planning for time.