[chapter-delegates] Results of the board discussion on membership

[James M Galvin]

First, let me thank Rosa, Veni, and Patrick for sending their summary of 
the Board discussions.  The staff specifically asked the Board to 
consider the question of whether they wanted individual paying members 
who would be eligible to elect trustees.  Not only did the Board devote 
considerable time to the question but I know that many of the trustees (I 
did not confirm with all so I do not know about all the Trustees) did 
read the archive of this list.  You can be sure they were quite familiar 
with the issues.

As they stated, the Board did not take any formal action, which simply 
means they did not wish to change any of the decisions of the last 3 
years.  It is now the staff's responsibility to respond to the Chapters' 
reactions, within the requirements set by the Board over the last 3 years.

Second, the staff message will come out tomorrow.  We need more time 
because as the Trustees already noted, we told the Board we would revisit 
some of the details of the program with the Chapters.  It is our 
intention to get that process started with our message tomorrow and we 
need time to prepare for that.

The only thing I would like to add to the summary posted is a reminder 
that Chapters and Individual Members are not the only community of 
interest that the Board must consider.  Certainly we all want the 
Individual and Chapter Programs to be a "good thing" for as many people 
as possible, but they also have to be a "good thing" for all of ISOC. 
ISOC is more than the sum of its Chapters and Individual members.

Jim






--On Saturday, March 12, 2005 4:16 PM -0700 Patrick Vande Walle 
<patrick at isoc.lu> wrote:

> Dear chapter delegates,
>
> This is a common message of Rosa, Veni and myself on the results of the
> board discussion on membership.
>
> First of all, we would like to thank all those who have contributed
> their ideas to this list.
>
> The board understands chapters concerns so it recognizes that we need
> to communicate more frequently and discuss chapter and member related
> issues with the chapters earlier in the decision process and this was
> addressed during the BoT meeting.
>
> This issue  could be addressed through different channels like
> teleconferences, online chats, etc. We need to explain in much greater
> detail the why's and how's of the decisions taken.
>
> Regarding the paying membership program, the sense of the board is that
> the program will neither be cancelled nor postponed. However, is the
> light of your comments, ISOC will put the program under review to
> address the issues, like the names of the different membership
> categories.
>
> We encourage everyone to continue providing ideas to the
> chapter-delegates mailing list.
>
> All the best,
>
> Rosa, Veni and Patrick