JANUARY 2003

Constitution and Bylaw Committee Update

by Valerie Schulz, Chair

The committee, composed of Paul English, Tom Ewing, Ed Heath, and Valary Schulz, has been considering six issues to date, and will be proposing amendments to the Constitution and to the Bylaws for the delegates' consideration. Four items were described in the prior Delegates' Voice:

1. Electronic Ballot Amendment
2. AAPG Ethics Committee Amendment
3. Advisory Council Experience Balancing Amendment
4. Additional Nominations Procedures,

and comments have been invited from the Association members and Delegates.

As a reminder of the amendment procedures as prescribed by our freshly amended Article XIV of our Bylaws, an amendment may be proposed by a majority vote of the Officers of the House of Delegates and the Chairmen of the Constitution and Bylaws Committee of the HoD. The following amendment, referred to as

5. "The Selection Integrity Amendment" was resolved by a unanimous vote of the Officers of the House of Delegates and the Chair of the Constitution and Bylaws Committee on 31 October, 2002, and has been distributed to the Executive Committee, the Advisory Council, the C&BL Committee, and by this report, to the members of the House of Delegates.

   ARTICLE II. OFFICERS, EXECUTIVE DIRECTORS, AND ASSOCIATION POSITIONS

A Proposed Addition of a Section 14:

Section 14: Limitations on Nomination and Honors & Awards

a) Any member serving on an AAPG governing body shall not be eligible to be nominated for office or selected for an honor & award by the governing body on which they serve, except for the House of Delegates' Recognition of Service Award.

b) Candidates for any AAPG office may not be selected to receive any honor & award by any AAPG governing body during the period of their candidacy, unless the honor or award has been announced prior to the announcement of their candidacy.

The rational for this proposal is to maintain the fairness and impartiality of the AAPG officer nomination and honors & award process as well as to avoid perceptions of favoritism for candidates in the election process. As the author of this amendment stated, "Eliminating members of the governing body from consideration protects the rights of all members to compete for nominations and honors & awards on an equal basis". Does it surprise you that our association might require such a directive? One would expect that we all possess the personal integrity to eliminate oneself from consideration for office or honors on any Board, Committee, or Council. We invite your comments.

6. Elsewhere in this issue, a considered analysis of the sixth issue under discussion, "The Executive Session", is presented by George Eynon. We invite your comments on this topic as well. Our attorney, Craig Blackstock has advised that Executive Session is most often required by public bodies to discuss personnel issues such as hiring, firing, discussion of raises, as well as litigation discussions where public disclosure might jeopardize an entities legal position. As it stands, Executive Session may not be invoked without a vote. Is it not incumbent upon the Chair of any body to require the members of that committee conduct themselves in an appropriate manner? Is it not the obligation of the Chair to run a clean meeting, and not to allow gossip and unsubstantiated derisive comments about anyone? Are we not all bound by our code of ethics to not malign other geologists?

Let us know how you feel.

In this issue...

Committee Reports

> 15 YEARS AGO: SEPM Separates from AAPG

> Officers and Committees

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