Did you see the response to this article that was in this weeks Independent? I particularly enjoyed reading that when the board didn't like the explanation of the rules they were reading in Robert's Rules, they went searching to outside sources until they found the response THEY were looking for! You just gotta love'm! It's on the Sun City Advocates website. Regarding the article in the March 21st Independent, “RCSC meeting format changed.” Unraveling a disaster Where does one start to unravel the disaster of that Reconsidered motion? First of all, Director McAdam was correct that the motion to Reconsider was out of order because it was required to be reconsidered at the meeting in which it was presented (see RONR 37:10). Second, the monthly meetings are just that. Each one is a meeting and each one is considered a session because the entire order of business was completed in that one meeting (see RONR 8:4). Defining a session When Director Lehrer stated that “Historically, the sessions of the boards meetings run from January thru December…” she was correct on one point, and that point is the term “sessions” except that she interpreted it incorrectly. Each meeting that is completed in a single day (unless it’s an adjourned meeting) is a session, so when she reads “the sessions of the board” that is actually referring to each individual, separate meeting and not a year-long series of meetings that carries unfinished business over from one meeting to another! And to be clear, Robert’s Rules doesn’t address motions that require more than one reading or vote, so that doesn’t have any bearing on what Robert’s Rules define as a session. If a session is to be determined as a year-long series of meetings then the bylaws must state that (see RONR 8:4). If you were at the meeting or watched it on the RCSC YouTube channel you would have also heard Director Lehrer try to validate her interpretation of a session was because all unfinished business dies at end of the year. To be clear, unfinished business dies at the end of the year due to the term limits for at least 3 of the Directors and has nothing to do with being a session. Hunting for answers in the state of Washington Lastly and most importantly, why did the board have to go to a third party website out of the state of Washington to find the answers they were looking for when they could have gone to the Robert’s Rules of Order website and received the actual interpretation of the actual rule from the guys who actually wrote them? I do it all the time and receive responses within the hour from at least 3 parliamentarians! Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, but not their own facts! Tom Marone, Advisory Panel, Sun City Advocates
That Marone guy seems pretty smart. Isn't that the same guy who they never even gave an interview to on the ad hoc by-laws committee? (Full disclosure (well kind of); Tom is a friend of mine who frequently follows this site and sometimes comments here and is a part of the Sun City Advocates). Here's why none of the above surprises me. To be clear, the writing i have done for the past 15 years have been about one thing and one thing only: Control. Let me expand; absolute and total control. From the day the departed gm came here and saw how much input the community could have in the process, she was uncomfortable with it. Once she settled in and found her rhythm, the end game was displacing the voice of the community with her vision for a better Sun City. She quickly came to understand it was easier to convince a handful of golfing board members who wanted to be less involved than it was the community at large. It is exactly why i asked readers if they have the capacity for intellectual honesty. The standard line from our critics is, but Sun City is wonderful. And for many it is indeed. For others, it's not. For those who think it is perfect, answer me this; why can't we go online and find how how and where the PIF dollars were spent? Hell, i used to brag about the idea Sun City would have 150 million to 300 million dollars to invest in keeping the amenities up to date. Where is it being spent? Why is it a secret? Why should anything happening in Sun City be a secret? Why should the community not know they subsidized golf to the tune of 25 million dollars in the last 12 years? Why should we not know how many single home owners are living here and subsidizing married couples? Why shouldn't we know how many of those single (most often women) falling behind in paying their yearly assessments and are being bludgeoned to death by the collection agency they are turned over to for collections? The point is really, REALLY simple, even for the stout of heart who believe everything in Sun City is perfect or near on to it: Why isn't everything done in the community held up to the light of day and shown to those of us who own it? I will tell you why; they (the RCSC management and several of the board members) believe it is theirs and not ours. They see us as card holders whose primary role is to pay the bills. That is why the general manager worked so hard to destroy the by-laws as we knew them. So to answer Marone's question, they went to a state far away for justifying their actions because it was what fit their narrative and because they could. It's that simple stinking why.
The reason they went to the Washington State agency was because it gave them the answer they were looking for, but if they were able too actually understand what they were reading they would have picked-up on the fact that many governing bodies in Washington write their own special rules of order that would take precedence over Robert's Rules of Order, and that's apparently what they did in Washington State! Here's what that website actually stated: "In addition, many governing bodies in Washington State allow the motion to be made at the next regular meeting. Your rules of procedure have higher authority than Robert’s Rules." So now we have the RCSC board, who doesn't understand their own Bylaws, using the procedures written for city councils that were are exclusively for use in another state! Once again, if the RCSC board actually understood what Robert's Rules of Order was all about they could easily write their own special rules that would override the rules they don't like in Robert's Rules. Seems like they just keep digging themselves into a deeper hole?
They do indeed FYI; the problem is, they just don't care. It's what happens when a board becomes enamored with their ability to just do as they please. They spent the past 15 years building a bridge too far and they have no idea how to get off of it. Perhaps more frustrating is, they really could care less how the membership[ feels or what they think.
My mea culpa! So...I received an email from Rusty Bradshaw this morning regarding the article I sent in to the Independent. He asked me if I thought that it was the boards decision to go looking for a third-party justification to allow the motion to be reconsidered or if it was my belief it was simply part of Rusty's research? I told him it was my understanding that it was the board who went looking for justification and commented that I didn't understand why he would go to a third-party resource in an attempt to validate the boards decision that it was okay too go ahead and reconsider that motion when it was really out of order! So he tells me it was him, and he did go to Robert's Rules first but they were to difficult to navigate so he went looking else ware! I told him what he failed to recognize was the fact that reason the Washington State agencies allowed the motion on the next day was because they wrote their own special procedure!?!?! So...bottom line; I guess I was wrong to accuse the Board of looking for third-party justification, but I still don't understand why Rusty would go looking for and print a justification in that article? The board was still wrong in allowing that motion to be reconsidered and I will take that belief to grave!
Oh, Tom, feel your pain. After reading the report by Rusty, I, too, wondered why the Board would go to Washington state to find their answers and then I deduced that maybe Rusty, in writing his story, was the one who did that. Perhaps you could ask him to put a Clarification (correction? Explanation) to explain what happened. I'm surprised he didn't mention it in his article.
