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Hi, Eric, Based on the examples of people who want to run during this election cycle, I agree with the idea of changing our bylaws. I think they should be less strict as far as length of time in the Green Party and length of absence from another party. Of course, even if our bylaws allow for people to run as Green candidates without longterm or recent Green registration, the convention-goers and their locals can still vote down their requests to run as Green candidates if the prospect truly isn't Green or is a Johnny (or Jenny) come lately that is trying to run Green for the wrong reasons. Tanya
Hi, As noted by me before, I am good with moving this state convention proposal to the listserve for the official vote this time.I did sign up for notifications about different boards and they are working great.I think the main issue is that we don't know about new topics/boards/messages on the forum when the first one is put up, unless we check the forum. To solve that, we either empower a forum moderator or the person who posts the first message in a new discussion to also send a notice to the council listserve that a new discussion is up. Better than that would be if a moderator or posting person had the ability through this forum to email/notify all forum members of the new discussion (so no use of old listserve), or even better yet is if there were a default on this forum that all new discussions would get sent out to forum members (but no additional messages from that discussion unless the person has actually visited it and clicked on notify). Tanya
Hi, Jonesy and Bill,Before the voting gets started, how do we know for sure that only official council members are voting? We don't want unlimited people from each chapter voting on the forum (or listserve) do we? Is subscription to this council forum restricted to council members- I mean technologically. I know that philosophically it is, but is that function enabled?Also, Art & Bill & Eric, You might want to confirm with all chapter chairs who their online council reps are so when counting votes, we know that no more than the 4 reps from each chapter have voted. Kevin or Charlie might have a suggestion about this or know the official tally (but it still might not hurt to update that).The online council reps for Adams Jefferson are: Tanya Ishikawa, Michael Haughey, Larry Dunn and Tom Langley.Tanya
Hi, Ryan, As far as submitting a proposal to the council facilitator for a vote, in the past the proposer would just sent the proposal like you have made directly to the facilitator (who was Kevin A. but is now Art G.) and they would post it to the council listserv. To standardise procedures so people were familiar with the rules and process, Kevin used to have some wording that he would send out with the proposal when it was sent back to council. (Having the facilitator send it out started the agreement seeking process and made it officially a proposal that was part of council business- rather than willy-nilly having each proposer posting stuff.)Though you haven't used the former format for proposals (see below) I think it is fine, but we usually require two sponsors of each proposal so you should find one more person to sponsor. I don't think I am the right person for that this time as I am so torn about the different location options and I am concerned about whether you will find more people to help you as an organizing task force in a location without a chapter. So, please ask another person to be your co-sponsor.After the proposal goes to the facilitator, the process is luckily out of the proposer's hands and left up to the facilitator to complete (moderating voting, tallying voting, and announcing results, all in a timely way).Below is wording that Art can use when he posts the proposal to the listserve:Dear Council Members,This is proposal 09-11 to elect a co-chair to fill the vacanct co-chairposition through our state meeting next month, at which point, per ourbylaws, both co-chair positions will be up for election.The voting period will last for one week ending on Sunday, May 8th, 2011.A quorum of 75% requires at least one response from six (6) chapters. Thereare currently eight (8) active voting chapters in the Green Party ofColorado:Adams/JeffcoArapahoe CountyDenverGreater BolulderPoudre ValleyRoyal GorgeSan MiguelSouthwestThank you,Kevin AlumbaughCurrent Council Facilitator1. Date proposed: May 1, 2011, Eric Fried, GPCO Secretary; co-sponsor TanyaIshikawa, co chair.2. Title: Proposal to elect a GPCO co-chair to fill vacancy until statemeeting3. Text of the actual proposal: The election will open on Monday, May 2,2011 and close on Sunday, May 8th, 2011 at midnight. There are threecandidates, Victor Forsythe, Art Goodtimes, and Ryan Jones, who have eachsubmitted biographies/statements (below). Since there are three candidates,in an effort to choose a co-chair who represents the preference of themajority of council, the election will use instant runoff voting,specifically the sequential elimination method. Each voter will have theoption to rank the candidates in preference order by assigning #1 to theirfirst choice, #2 to their second choice, and #3 to their third choice. Inthe first round of voting, the #1 choices will be tallied. If any candidatehas over 50% of the #1 choices, they will be declared the winner. If no onehas over 50% of #1 choices, the candidate with the fewest #1 choices iseliminated, and votes for that candidate are reallocated to whichevercandidate on those ballots is listed as the #2 choice (or #3 choice in theevent no #2 is listed). These #2 (or #3) votes will be added to the #1 votesof the remaining candidates, and which ever candidate has the most votes inthe second round will be declared the winner. Voters do not need to rank anycandidates beyond #1, but in the event their candidates is eliminated in thefirst round, their votes would not be able to be reassigned to their secondchoice. Since the GPCO has no established procedure for breaking ties, atstate meetings or in council votes, a virtual coin flip will be used by thecouncil facilitator in concert with the state secretary, usinghttp://flip-coin.com/ Votes will be tallied by the council facilitator,acting in concert with the state secretary. (since we will have a tally ofall the votes, this will be a transparent process.)4. Background: Our bylaws state:5.8 If a Green Party of Colorado officer’s position is vacated in betweenofficial state meetings, the Council or both co-chairs in agreement may makea temporary appointment in the manner as specified in the Procedures andGuidelines until the next state meeting under consultation with each local.And our Procedures and Guidelines section 3.7 stateThe GPCO co-chairs, after conferring together, can make a "good untilchallenged appointment" of a volunteer for a vacancy to any of the followingpositions: coalition representative, meeting facilitator or councilfacilitator ...or any other non-decision making position...Since we do not have co-chairs, and this IS a decision-making position, wedo not have established procedures and guidelines for how to make this"appointment." The state officers felt the best way forward was to conductan election to allow the council to select a co-chair to fill the vacancyuntil the state meeting in late June, at which point both co-chair positionswill be up for their normal one-year terms (as well as all state officersincluding Secretary and Treasurer, which are elected to two-year terms atstate meetings in odd numbered year, such as 2011). The Green Party platformencourages the use of instant runoff voting for single-seat elections, suchas an executive officer like co-chair.5. Justification/Goals: It might have been preferable to fill the co-chairvacancy earlier, but given the internal investigation we undertook, followedby processing the recommendations of the steward who conducted theinvestigation, this was not possible. It would be helpful to fill thevacancy now so we have our full complement of state officers, and so theco-chair can assist with things like helping start the Mediation Council andpreparing for and running the state meeting.6. Pros: We fill our co-chair vacancy, take pressure off Tanya Ishikawa, whohas been our sole co-chair for the last few months since Adam Taylor movedto Australia, and use a method designed to achieve a higher level ofagreement than plurality voting.7. Cons: None seen, unless people prefer to keep the position mandated byour bylaws unfilled.8. Estimate of Fiscal Impact: $09. Alternatives to the proposal: Do not fill the position until the statemeeting. Fill the position using plurality voting (no majority needed, mostvotes win) or using a traditional runoff method (if no one gets over %0% ofthe votes in round one, the top two candidates advance to a runoff election,a second vote is held, the winner becomes co-chair).
Plus another item for discussion is the possibility of a new location: Gunnison. Art Goodtimes has a contact there that may be willing to organize our meeting there. It would be a fair distance for both ends of the state. Plus, it may help get a new chapter organized for the Gunnison area (Crested Butte, Monarch…). I would even be willing to make a trek up there some weekend in late Feb or early March to speak at a chapter organizational meeting. Then, we might have a new chapter to approve at the state meeting. Just an idea.Tanya
Hello,Thanks, Ryan, for putting up this proposal. It was something we were missing in this process. We need the state officers and/or the council facilitator to inform the Council of the proper voting procedure. Are we using agreement-seeking (both on this email listserve and the forum)?Therefore, are we looking for all online council reps from each local chapter (up to 4 for each chapter plus the state officers) to give their agreement or not? In the past, I believe the votes would have been: agree, standaside or block, and then we go to a vote if there are any blocks. Is that right, now?What is the time period for this vote? Usually, after a proposal was posted by the facilitator in the past, we had one week to vote (though sometimes we abbreviated the time period when expedience was necessary). I would stand aside on this proposal because I would be fine with having the meeting in Glenwood Springs and with spending up to $250 for a meeting space. But, I think the proposal is not complete because I have doubts about our ability to find a task force to organize the meeting in Glenwood. Nobody has stepped up yet. Are Ryan and Eric ready to help do the organizing? That would be great. If we have the meeting in Telluride, we definitely have people to organize it, arrange the meeting space, and even find lodging options for us. I really would have liked to have the meeting in Telluride but I feel a late spring or summer meeting is better in Telluride. Maybe we could do the state meeting in 2013 there in late May or June. Tanya Ishikawa Adams-Jefferson Green
