Rules of Order

I have been the Secretary of the Board of our neighborhood association for three years now. I’ve been a Board member for six. Board members serve three-year terms, and I’m almost finished my second term, and I don’t have to run again (and I definitely don’t want to but that’s a long story that you don’t want to read right now). The problem is that people who are willing to run for the Board are few and far between and I feel that it’s my responsibility to remain on the Board until the rest of the group are more experienced (we have three members who are brand-new). I haven’t really decided what to do yet. If someone else wants to run for my seat, I’ll happily step aside. If not then I will run again but it will be my last time. 

But last night tested my willingness to even serve out my current term let alone run for a third. The man whom I wrote about here attended our monthly meeting, as he always does. His wife, who is the immediate past Secretary, also attended, as she always does. The two of them, who have lived in our neighborhood for many years and who know the association rules really well (because they wrote most of them) labor under a persistent delusion that the rest of us are idiots and that we need close supervision. They also believe that they are communicating their doubts about our competence in a subtle and discreet manner. They are wrong. 

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Long story short, before it’s too late - we are going to have to begin enforcing the rules of order. Our rules provide community members who are not on the Board with an open forum at the beginning of the meeting. During this time, anyone who wants to speak gets five minutes to say whatever they want. Members can also request a dedicated spot on the agenda. And then if they want to speak during the rest of the meeting, they have to be recognized by the Chair. And if we have only 15 minutes remaining in the meeting, the Chair might not recognize anyone who isn’t on the Board, especially anyone who is very very likely to speak for 14 of the remaining 15 minutes. We can’t allow people to turn every meeting into a free-for-all, for two very important reasons: I have to take notes during these stupid meetings, and keeping up with the legitimate business of the Board is enough. And I don’t want any meeting to run for even one minute past its appointed time.

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The President (of the Association, that is) is going to announce the new world order at the next meeting. We’ll see how it goes. In a little more than three years, it’ll be someone else’s problem, I guess.