RAAus - Constitutional Change - Proposal Lend your support

[Guest pembs]

It's time for the membership to take some action on the lethargy of a large percentage of the board. The president has not kept his promise to keep the membership informed. Therefore I propose to challenge the constitution with your help. If you agree then email your full name and membership number to [email protected] and I will add you to the following letter:

 

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We as a collective being <INSERT names>as of this date a financial member(s) of RAAus with membership number <INSERTED><INSERT numbers member>hereby request that you convene a special general meeting of all members within the required time from the date of this letter to vote to change the constitution of Recreational Aviation Australia Inc to the following, four (4) suggested changes.<o:p></o:p>

 

--- Start Constitutional Change Request ---<o:p></o:p>

 

That the minutes of General Meetings and Annual General Meetings be published to the membership not more than 30 days after the meeting (s) have finished.<o:p></o:p>

 

This should be published in one or more of the suggested mediums:<o:p></o:p>

 

1. Member Magazine<o:p></o:p>

 

2. On the Official RAAus web site<o:p></o:p>

 

3. As an inclusion into the magazine<o:p></o:p>

 

<o:p></o:p>

 

--- End Constitutional Change Request ---<o:p></o:p>

 

--- Start Constitutional Change Request ---<o:p></o:p>

 

That the financial statement of accounts be published twice yearly to the membership, the first occasion being not more than 30 days after the AGM, thereafter 6 months later. <o:p></o:p>

 

This should be published in one or more of the suggested mediums:<o:p></o:p>

 

4. Member Magazine<o:p></o:p>

 

5. On the Official RAAus web site<o:p></o:p>

 

6. As an inclusion into the magazine<o:p></o:p>

 

<o:p></o:p>

 

--- End Constitutional Change Request ---<o:p></o:p>

 

<o:p></o:p>

 

--- Start Constitutional Change Request ---<o:p></o:p>

 

The maximum number of consecutive terms that a member can occupy on the RAAus Board is set at 3 (three) terms, except for the following circumstances:

 

When no other member is nominated for election to the board in the same State/Territory or Category

 

The exception to this rule being that for continuity the current President can be nominated for a following term taking the Presidents maximum term to (4) four

 

<o:p></o:p>

 

--- End Constitutional Change Request ---<o:p></o:p>

 

<o:p></o:p>

 

<o:p></o:p>

 

<o:p></o:p>

 

--- Start Constitutional Change Request ---<o:p></o:p>

 

That voting for any constitutional change may be sent via electronic means to the RAAus, that is by fax or scanned document or any other cost saving method which will be more efficient.<o:p></o:p>

 

--- End Constitutional Change Request ---<o:p></o:p>

 

 

[Guest burbles1]

Shouldn't you state "... not more than 30 days after ..." or "... within 30 days..."? The current wording implies that the Board has no time limit to respond, which is currently the case.

 

 

[Guest pembs]

Burbles thanks for that duly amended

 

 

[Admin]

Pembs...my comments if I may

 

Firstly congratulations on a stand that members must unfortunately have to take...it is not right that it has come to this and you have my support.

 

The wording "this will save thousands of dollars on postage and will be more efficient" should not be included in the proposed amendments. If you want the constitution to make note of cost reduction then possibly a rewording to something like "or other cost reducing methods"...I am no English teacher

 

 

 

Lastly the maximum consecutive terms amendment. The President is the one that mostly deals with CASA apart from the CEO. Do you think that for continuity that if a President is at the end of his 3 consecutive terms that he should stay on for another term...this will ensure any information of what is happening is kept fluent with the Board.

 

 

 

Just me initial thoughts and well done Mate!...The members OWN the Association, it is YOURS and you have the RIGHT to have a SAY in it.

 

 

 

[Guest pembs]

Thanks Ian. I agree I will make the amendments...

 

 

[Guest basscheffers]

While I do agree with the spirit of the reason for these changes, I am not sure what they are going to achieve.

 

If you want minutes from the AGM quicker, attendants can make their own and distribute to the members.

 

If you want a financial statement, you can ask for one. (Though I am not sure how responsive the Secretary is to that)

 

I get the impressions that many board members are obsessed with micro-managing things that should be "business as usual" items for the full time staff. The website comes to mind.

 

The board is there to set strategy, staff is there to implement it, with the board there to keep them honest.

 

Setting the staff a clear guidance and letting them get on with it and motivating the members to "get out there" at the local level to make RA-Aus great is what the board should be doing. Having hour long discussions about the colour scheme of a hypothetical new website is not it.

 

I do not think your proposed changes are not going to achieve that. The only way to change this culture is to put your hand up and be nominated, then get elected. Remember most board seats go unopposed at elections!

 

 

[winsor68]

"If you want a financial statement, you can ask for one. (Though I am not sure how responsive the Secretary is to that)"

 

You can ask all you want... they don't answer (or do they just answer those who are in the "club"?)... They won't even shake your hand!!!

 

 

[facthunter]

Format.

 

Just a suggestion.

 

IF there are numerous pages that you wish to amend, ( and even if there is only one) affected you can approach the process by saying,

 

Proposed change(s.) to (whatever Rule)..

 

(1) On page (X) Line 2 delete." and the sun came up" and replace.

 

with "and the moon came up".

 

Reason for change.... reflect reality.

 

(2) Page (y) line 4 para 2 editorial consequence of change #1.

 

and so on.......

 

At the end you can summarise the reasons why the changes are sought. (put your argument.)

 

You may have better ideas but if not , This might be helpful. It can be presented simply and unambiguously. Regards Nev

 

 

[Powerin]

I think Bas is probably right. Changing the constitution may not help. But here's some thoughts on the proposed changes for what they're worth:

 

1. The constitution already says the secretary should give minutes to the "Editor" for inclusion in the mag [section 25 (vi)]. (Does this happen? Has it ever happened?) Rather than putting a new rule in the constitution, I would perhaps amend 25(vi) to have the 30 day time limit. Bear in mind that in the future any of the "suggested" media may cease to exist.

 

2. Two sets of financials per year may not show much more than one and will cost more to prepare. How about getting the audited financials for the previous year and the treasurers proposed budget for the coming year circulated to members? This should give a reasonable indication of how things are going.

 

3. I suggest either you set a limit of consecutive terms or you don't. If you have exemptions for the chair or for when there are no other nominations then nothing will change and the rule just becomes confusing. Even now there are rarely any other nominations. Note also that the chairperson is elected each year by the board members. So there is never any guarantee of the continuity of any chairperson's position anyway. You have to trust your elected board members to choose wisely.

 

4. If you have electronic transfer of voting forms you have to rely on office staff to spend more time collecting votes from various mediums, verifying their authenticity, printing them out as hard copy, adding them to the proxied votes and correctly delivering them all to the returning officer who counts the votes. This may cause more problems and cost than it saves. I don't think it is up to a constitution to say what is cost efficient and what is not. It will change over time. Perhaps it is more relevant to have a convenient voting system which results in members bothering to vote...whatever it costs.

 

My humble opinions only. I applaud your efforts so far. More of us should do the same if we believe the board is not serving our best interests!

 

 

[Guest pembs]

Thanks for the advice I will take it onboard - rgds Pembs

 

 

[Admin]

Powerin, I have been told many many times by members who would like to put up their hand to help out by standing at a board election that they DON'T simply because with the very same people running each time they will just end up looking like a fool when they are beaten. Why are they beaten, not because the board member may be doing a good job but because of apathy on the most part by members in voting and by the fact that a CFI (of which many of the board are) has trained many members and who do you think the sun shines out of, the person who trained you to fly.

 

Many darn good candidates have told me they don't bother because of this.

 

Meanwhile the current finances are..., we currently have no budget and...oops and darn it, due to confidentiality I am not allowed to say anything...I wonder how many trained accountants are there in the membership who were going to put their hand up at an election but don't :big_grin:

 

 

[Guest pembs]

Ian is absolutly right, how can an organisation function and more importantly move foward with the times , with little or no new blood to bring in new ideas. How can an organisation function with no budget!! For instance how much does NATFLY cost the membership, can we afford it next year etc........

 

 

[Powerin]

Sounds like a good case for limiting consecutive terms then.

 

But sometimes changing a constitution to fix a particular problem at a particular time can backfire later. What if you get a great board, that's working well, only to have half the members leave because of this rule? But maybe that's the risk you have to take to fix things.

 

The constitution allows for the removal of any board members at any time. The process is the same....you get 5% members to support the calling of a general meeting and a resolution needs to be passed by members votes. However, you would only need more than 50% of the votes to pass the resolution. You need 75% to change the constitution.

 

 

[Deskpilot]

........ If the RA-Aus had a decent website,........

The sooner this site becomes the 'official' site, the better.

 

 

[Guest davidh10]

Pembs;

 

While I agree that the members should be better informed and in a timely manner, I think your proposal as it stands needs some work...

 

In the first instance, I would have thought you could phone the CEO and enquire why members are seemingly unable to obtain the association's financial report, other than by physically attending the office. The constitution does not prohibit it. The secretary has simply relied on it for minimum compliance, in the post that indicated a refusal to email it. If the explanation is unsatisfactory, you could phone the President and make enquiries.

 

I would have thought that only after these avenues have failed, should anyone move to try to force information dissemination through constitutional change.

 

After an AGM, the secretary compiles a record of the meeting, which in all liklihood is titles "Minutes of...", however those are not "Minutes" or an official record of the meeting until accepted by a vote at the next meeting. In the case of an AGM, and in the absence of a passed motion at the AGM to enable confirmation of the Minutes at an earlier time / occasion, will be confirmed at the next AGM. Thus, for AGMs in most organisations, the Minutes will always be a year after the meeting plus any reasonable office time to effect a distribution.

 

Does Ra-Aus hold any GMs? Many associations don't. They just hold the three "committee" meetings required by law and the AGM. This makes it difficult to confirm the Minutes earlier than the next AGM. The only option is to allow the Board (Committee) to confirm the AGM Minutes. That has to be done by a Motion at the AGM, and if passed would enable minutes to be published after the next Board Meeting.

 

An alternate tack, not involving constitutional change, may be to look at whether the non-attending members at an AGM are being provided with adequate information to enable a Proxy Vote. Surely if the financial statements and Treasurer's report are presented at the AGM for acceptance, they need to be in the Notice of Meeting to enable members to vote for or against by Proxy. Under the Associations Act, the "Committee" can be liable to fines for certain infringements.... Needs some research.

 

You cannot put "Suggested changes" to a meeting. They need to be concrete amendments naming the paragraph and changes. Each change needs to be framed as a "Special Resolution", keeping in mind that each "Special Resolution" may be passed or fail. Thus dependent changes need to be grouped in the one "Special Resolution".

 

Special Resolutions cannot be amended at the meeting, as they need to be set out in the notice of meeting to ALL members with the required minimum 21 day notice period. Thus if they are found to be wanting in wording, conflict with other provisiuons, are not permitted by law etc.., the only choice is that they fail and the whole process has to be repeated. It should also be noted that passing a Constitutional change, is not effective until the Associations Registrar confirms acceptance of the changes (ie. it does appear to not contravene any laws governing associations).

 

The reasons for change need to be in the Notice of Meeting, not in the constitution. It is the members that need convincing to vote for the change. The constitution is simply a rules framework for the organisation which ties down areas not already stipulated in the Associations Act and can override provisions in the statutory "Model Rules" which the Act includes, where not overridden.

 

Changing a constitution is a complex process, not the least because so few people understand it, but also because of the external statutes that are incorporated, but not seen by people who only read the actual constitution document.

 

I'd suggest that you check out the ACT Government web site and read the Associations Act as well as the information about creation of incorporated entities and the processes around creating and amending constitutions (usually referred to as "Rules of Association"). Incorporated bodies are governed under state legislation in the state of incorporation.

 

* I'm familiar with Victoria's legislation, but have not looked specifically at the ACT statutes.

 

* I do not hold any legal qualification and am not giving legal advice.

 

 

[Guest davidh10]

First, let me congratulate the proposer for having a go. And also to all who participate in this discussion here. Ir does beg the question as to why this can't be done on an RA-Aus website where all RA-Aus members could participate.

While this site may have started with a focus on RaAus, it is now much broader, so it is not IMHO appropriate to meld it with the RaAus site. I can understand a reluctance to have member opinion on the RaAus site, but that is why we have this one.

 

It certainly does not prevent RaAus using specific fora on this site for communication and feedback with members.

 

Incidentally, should the Chair of the Board of RA-Aus be titled "President"? This infers to me either head of a club (which we are not) or Chief Executive Officer (which he is not). I do prefer Chairman or for those more PC Chairperson.

"President" is correct. There are some mandatory positions in an Association. This is specified in the Act.

 

How to get more members to Vote? Allow more time for campaigning say 3 months and allow candidates more opportunity to promote their candidacy through the Magazine.

Good idea. :)

 

Why don't more members vote? Partly because their is often no choice of candidates. For new members, like me, it is a matter of not having had enough experience with our Association to be able to express a meaningful opinion.

I did vote, but also being new, I could only rely on the candidates statements and no personal knowledge or history of the candidates.

 

 

[winsor68]

That is the first thing a new member notices about Ra-Aus... the website I have been seeing for more years that I can remember has not changed at all. What the hell are they doing with their time? I would have thought that having a good up to date website that is easy for visitors,new members and old to browse is sort of a no brainer for a competent management to implement??? It just stinks of stagnation... ironically when we are told the organization has grown enormously...

 

Something just ain't right??????

 

 

[Guest basscheffers]

I did vote, but also being new, I could only rely on the candidates statements and no personal knowledge or history of the candidates.

If the candidates, both new and incumbents, were actually active in their state, you wouldn't have to vote just on the one statement.

Now there's a novel idea for someone trying to take over a seat in the next elections: campaigning.

 

 

[Guest davidh10]

...I was not suggesting this site meld with RA-Aus but that the RA-Aus site should be able to facilitate such a fundamental (to RA-Aus) discussion. And, like others have said, their website is rubbish. Good content but ancient functionality.

This web site is "Dynamic" (noun), meaning the pages don't actually exist on the server, but are built in response to every individual page request from a page template and data from a database query. Every post is stored in its own database record, so building a page with say 20 posts, requires accessing 20 database records and combining that data with a page template. This is all accomplished by software that runs in the web server.

 

Dynamic sites require someone with programming and systems integration expertise to set up, but once that is done, many people can contribute and publish or update articles, as we are used to here, and without needing any web language knowledge. They can even have workflow where articles have to be approved before publication.

 

Unlike Static sites, the site software has to be maintained, patched and upgraded over time to keep up with security patches and or new functionality.

 

The RaAus web site is "Static". You build individual pages in a site builder application like Microsoft FrontPage (I don't know what John Brandon uses, but it declares a bunch of Microsoft namespaces), and then load all the files up to the web server.

 

Static sites are typically built either by people with a tool that allows them to work like MS Word and not understand the internals, or alternatively with tools that require deep knowledge of the web languages. They are good for information that does not change frequently and where the site is maintained by one person.

 

I agree that RA-Aus could improve the impression it makes on visitors by having a dynamic, well styled site that enables all appropriate contributors to maintain the information easily. I could build one for them, as could Ian, so it does not have to cost a bomb!

 

I don't agree that the RaAus web site should have forums, as it confuses visitors as to what is official communication and what is member or visitor opinion. I believe that this web site provides the members with fora that are not constrained by direct association with RaAus. Further, this site is open to a broader membership, and while there's 5,500 members there's only a small number of active posters... what would you guess....50! Of course there's probably a lot who post only a few times and then stop... and a bunch of lurkers. There's lots of interesting opinions published on this site, but is it representative of the opinions of RaAus members... You cannot know; and that's the issue of having it on the RaAus official site.

 

Sorry, people...getting a bit off topic.

 

 

[Guest basscheffers]

That is the first thing a new member notices about Ra-Aus... the website I have been seeing for more years that I can remember has not changed at all.

I have it on good authority that the reason nothing is happening is because there are enough board members who seem to want to design by committee (and then don't actually do anything) instead of just saying to the CEO: "Take $50K and outsource the making of a real good website."

That is the only involvement the board should have with the website.

 

But that's not how they feel about it, it seems...

 

 

[Guest davidh10]

I largely agree with all of what you said, David. But, what if the Members Forum was in a "Members Only" section and therefore not visible to the general public?

Good thought, but it is still a question of critical mass. It would be splitting contributions between this site and that site. Which posts should go on one and which on the other and which on both.

 

If Forums were only limited to organisational matters, it would be so dry that very few would bother reading it. At least here, it is interspersed with that other activity...................................... flying and related matters. That's what keeps me interested, and I'm happy to offer my opinions and meagre experience as well as to learn from others contributions.

 

Mmmm Flyyyyiinnng. Nearly time to check weather and Notams for this arvo ;-)

 

 

[Admin]

Static non-interactive web sites require no maintenance - the pages are written in html and only need to change if there is an update to that page. There is no security concerns, no database to manage, no performance issues and can be run by a single person say once a week or once a month - they can even write a word document, save it with a html extension and click a button to upload it to the static website...simple.

 

Dynamic interactive web sites require constant attention even if it is used very little as a content needs to be monitored constantly, security needs to be monitored constantly, requires code programming, database management knowledge, constant software upgrades etc etc etc.

 

The RAAus years ago had a type of forum which was an email list and managed by a board member (Howard - who was an IT professional) who needed to constantly monitor it. The legal ramifications of RAAus having a forum were enormous. It became a slaughterhouse and over taken by people with commercial interests. The board can not stop an RAAus member from saying what they like (within a certain reason) as that member is a part owner of the forum by way of being an RAAus member. Also who in the RAAus is going to spend every single day managing it. They could make all posts hidden until approved but again the time required, the members wouldn't like making a post and its not seen till the next day or whenever and who is going to moderate and whose opinions will be applied. It is a recipe for disaster on each board member. With my 6 years of experience here I have advised them on this several times but if they wish to sink themselves then I have done my bit and advised them against it. An RAAus forum will become and as seen before, a real political bashing ground with people trying to sell you their products thrown in and the board would not be allowed to stop it.

 

I have on 2 separate occasions offered them this site...they declined. I have again on 2 separate occasions offered this site to work with them as an officially "non-official" site to which they also declined. I developed a completely new dynamic web site with partial interaction on items they put out including a video conferencing system which didn't end up going anywhere.

 

The new RAAus website task was given to a board member several years ago and nothing was done. That same board member jumped in at my first board meeting and proposed that he control the development of a new website. At the last board meeting terms of reference were put forward with all kinds of pie in the sky things from non IT people and without the vast experience needed not just the development but THE MANAGEMENT of it (hey what a great thing we can have a wiki it was said ).

 

The situation now is this site has grown to be a sounding board of as much freedom of speech as is possible within the site rules, it is completely independent, managed by a group of people and not a single person and has been successful for all the things that the RAAus can't do without causing severe problems for the board and financial implications.

 

 

[winsor68]

This site and the Ra-aus site need to be kept independent in my opinion...

 

I have heard that the Ops Manual is being re-written... What is with the Ops manual saying one thing and the Ops Manager saying another?

 

What rules are we flying by if the Ops Manual is out of date?

 

Perhaps the rot goes deeper?

 

 

[docjell]

Basscheffers - you can request what you like, as I did recently. I wanted the latest AGM minutes and audited accounts. Section 36 of the constitution states that these may be made available to members at no charge "for viewing at the RAAus offices in the ACT - by the member in person". You were quoted the clause and then rather pompously concluded by saying "As such I am unable to comply with your request" As I live in far north Queensland this is effectively a prohibition clause and needs to go. Eugene Reid further believes that the minutes should be 'confidential' apparently. The RAAus elected officers are controlling OUR aviation interests with OUR money and should be OUR representatives. They are not currently - wake up everyone - kick off some of that appalling apathy, stand up and make our voices heard. Pembs has "put his hand up" as you suggested and is struggling to inject some sense and redirection into the RAAus as the member for North Queensland. We need to unite behind him and get some action happening.

 

 

[docjell]

OOps - the alzheimers again - of course Pembs isn't our NQ rep - Steve Runciman is - and an excellent if frustrating job he's doing as well. Can't tell these trike pilots apart you know