[Lpk-rules] FW: Rules Report

[Ken Moellman]

First, I must again note my objection that there is not an actual Rules 
Committee report under the current bylaws.  Any such report should have 
been posted online at least 60 days before the convention. There is no 
mechanism to waive this.  Posting something on the website which 
purports to be a report under 1100.3.2 constitutes a bylaws violation in 
itself. And 1100.3.4 can't happen because of the same timeline problems. 
/*Would the same "oopsie daisy it's okay" principle apply to members, or 
does that only apply to the Rules Committee?*/ All of this work should 
have happened in the 3 months where no meetings occurred.

The use of the word "shall" in 1100.3.2 does not give wiggle room.  At 
this point, there are two clear options which comply with the 
Constitution and Bylaws as written:

1. Delete the entire 1100.3 section of the bylaws, let RONR take care of 
it.  This is what I've wanted all along, and the creation of these rules 
outside convention has been my gripe all along.

2. Submit the proposal from an individual under Bylaw 1100.3.5 (but this 
does not automatically cause it to be considered, under the wording in 
1100.3.6, as it is not mentioned in 1100.3.6)

I realize that the rules just get ignored or re-interpreted whenever 
inconvenient, but this is what was passed, and the language is quite clear:

    *1100.3 RECOMMENDED CONSTITUTIONAL CHANGES *

    1100.3.1 The SPRC shall have one or more meetings to consider, and
    propose, changes to the State Party Constitution, in advance of
    convention as provided herein.

    1100.3.2 The Rules Committee _*shall*_ publish its proposed changes
    to the State Party Constitution not less than sixty (60) days prior
    to the state convention or any special convention called for the
    purpose of amending the constitution, the SPRC shall publish to the
    State Party Executive Committee, and to the Party's website,
    proposed changes. The Rules Committee _*shall*__*also*_ give notice
    to the members of the ability to comment in 1100.3.4 by posting it
    on the State Party's website.

    1100.3.3 Any member may submit proposed changes to the State Party
    Constitution to the Rules Committee not less than forty-five (45)
    days prior to the state convention or any special convention called
    for the purpose of amending the constitution.

    1100.3.4 The Rules Committee shall consider any proposed changes
    submitted by a member in accordance with 1100.3.3, and publish all
    member proposals, with rules committee comments, or any revisions to
    the Rules Committee report(s) they deem appropriate in light of
    member comments to the State Party Executive Committee, and to the
    Party's website, proposed changes, not less than thirty (30) days
    prior to the state convention or any special convention called for
    the purpose of amending the constitution.

    1100.3.5 Any member may also submit any additional proposal to the
    Rules Committee not less than fifteen (15) days prior to the state
    convention or any special convention called for the purpose of
    amending the constitution, and the Rules Committee shall publish
    such reports to the Party's website, and, if they desire, any
    comments thereon, or, if they do not review these proposals, the
    caveat will be placed that they have not had the opportunity to
    review or comment on the proposals.

    1100.3.6 The Convention body may consider any and all proposals (i)
    by the Rules Committee (or any minority report) under 1100.3.2,
    including revisions to same under 1100.3.4; (ii) any member
    proposals or comments thereto under 1100.3.4; (iii) with a
    suspension of the rules by the convention body through a two-thirds
    (2/3) vote; or (iv) the change or proposal either extraordinarily
    minor, or it lessens the scope of the proposal of the SPRC in terms
    of the burden upon party members or to increase their rights (i.e.,
    if the proposal is to increase dues by $5, it would be in order to
    change this to a $2 increase). /[ Note: Nothing about 1100.3.5 is
    specifically listed here ]/

Second, this committee had recommended the deletion of 900.6.8; the 
"takes effect upon close of convention" clause.  However, this 
recommendation was never presented to the Executive Committee.  This 
bylaw creates a tangled web, which is why its removal from the 
Constitution was proposed in 2017, and that passed. Re-creating the 
provision as a bylaw went directly against actions in convention. 
Barring action from others, I plan to bring this to the next Executive 
Committee meeting for ratification as it is critical that this happens.

    900.6.8      Any amendments proposed or passed at convention, to the
    Constitution of the Libertarian Party of Kentucky, shall not take
    effect until the moment the Convention adjourns.


Third, I strongly disagree with the blame-shifting for not meeting the 
deadline. While you have claimed you had planned to meet in "late 
December" to finish the report, the in-person meeting was called on 
December 19th.  Notice typically requires 7 days.  Were you planning to 
meet sometime between December 27th and December 31st? An emergency 
meeting held in the busy Christmas and New Years season?  During 
discussion on the meeting called on Jan 5th, there was one committee 
member who asked to have the meeting time moved. I said I would be happy 
to have more meetings, if someone else wanted to organize it/them. I 
said, at the time, /"//I am not opposed to additional meetings of the 
committee. I've been asking about them for months."/ No other meetings 
were called. To be fair, I was not watching the 60-day clock either, 
knowing that I would be submitting a complete proposal under my rights 
as a member under 1100.3.3, and had the 45-day mark in my head. But the 
purported committee report fails the 45-day mark.

Fourth, at the in-person meeting in Frankfort, Joey asked if we were 
going to review everything, even though the committee agreed to start 
with the report from the previous committee. It was agreed upon then 
that it would be so. That did not occur.

Fifth, I was within my rights as an LPKY member under the 
Executive-Committee-created Bylaw 1100.3.3 to submit a proposal, and did 
so within the rules. Alterations did in fact happen between the original 
submission in August and a few weeks ago; ones I would have preferred to 
have debated in this committee had the lack of meetings from April 
through August and October through December not been a de-facto 
filibuster of that process.  Further, I disagree with the setting of a 
narrative of an "omnibus" proposal.  The proposal is a complete 
proposal, including Operating Rules and Bylaws, in accordance with the 
original agreement made in Frankfort. My proposal enshrines Membership 
definition and rights, and core structure and responsibilities for 
governance.   While the committee wasn't acting, I still was an an 
individual; going so far as to put the Constitutional proposals into the 
preferred 3-column format, as has been requested by others, including 
those on this very committee.  Having a mere 8-10 meetings on something 
as important as our Constitution and other governing documents, 
especially in consideration of the massive change caused by very first 
vote we took to split things apart, is, IMO, a disservice to our members 
and defeats the purpose of a sub-committee.

Finally, I have serious concerns about this report.  We didn't discuss 
sub-committees at all, and what we have of a report has them broken 
apart between the Const and Op Rules. Why?  Why have a convoluted split 
definition? Why not put it all in Operating Rules? These are things I'd 
hoped to talk about on the Rules Committee in the 3 months that we did 
not meet.

I am reviewing it now, and comparing it against the audio of what was 
done on the committee; that this report feels extremely incomplete and 
disjointed causes me great concern.  On top of the obvious bylaws violation.


ken



On 1/29/19 4:23 PM, chris.wiest at lpky.org wrote:
>
> *From:* chris.wiest at lpky.org <chris.wiest at lpky.org>
> *Sent:* Sunday, January 27, 2019 2:54 PM
> *To:* 'Dave Capano' <dave at capano.com>; 'Chris Wiest' 
> <chris.wiest at lpky.org>; 'Cristi Kendrick' <cristi.kendrick at lpky.org>; 
> 'John Hicks' <john.hicks at lpky.org>; 'Joseph Redmon' 
> <joseph.redmon at lpky.org>; 'Mark Gailey' <mark.gailey at lpky.org>; 
> 'chris at cwiestlaw.com' <chris at cwiestlaw.com>
> *Cc:* 'harlen.compton at lpky.org' <harlen.compton at lpky.org>
> *Subject:* Rules Report
>
> Folks:
>
>  1. In the interest of time, I am attaching the report I had generated
>     in December from the minutes of our meetings, which summarized our
>     votes and recommendations.  I had held this report, when Mr.
>     Moellman scheduled the meeting in January, since it appeared that
>     perhaps a majority of this Committee felt like we should hold the
>     report and meet in person, as that was one of the items on the
>     agenda.  I realize we are now behind schedule, and I would have
>     simply moved forward with this process in late December that I am
>     doing now, but it appeared the majority of you wanted to take a
>     different approach and I wanted to respect that.
>
>  2. I intend to publish the attached report to the website and the
>     executive committee in the next 48 hours (January 29, 2019 at 4
>     pm).  If any of you have a beef with the report before that, let
>     me know.  I want to be clear: I do not view it as in order, or
>     appropriate, to revisit or reconsider the many hours and months of
>     work we have put in so I do not think that substantive changes are
>     in order if they were not made in our many meetings.  But, if this
>     report in any way does not reflect the votes that were taken or
>     recommendations we made, then I am happy to make corrections.
>
>  3. In the spirit of (2), if members want to change the rationale of
>     any proposal that they voted in favor of, or want to fairly change
>     the characterization of what it does (provided it meets the space
>     limitations), that is also in order.  If I think it gets into
>     advocacy, we may need to have a discussion or phone call to
>     discuss it.  I am going to hold this Tuesday afternoon, from 4-5
>     p.m., open for a telephone meeting for that purpose.
>
>  4. I am going to resend around Mr. Moellman’s 100+ page omnibus
>     proposals that he has gone back and done outside of our process. 
>     I want this committee to provide me comments to the
>     _CONSTITUTIONAL PROPOSALS ONLY AT THIS TIME_ if you have any.  We
>     will be posting his Constitutional proposals and his election
>     rule/bylaw proposals to the website this week (I have to go and
>     break them out, which is unfortunate, but I will do that), but
>     this Committee’s role is not to provide comments on his election
>     bylaws proposals.  My guess is that he and I will need to debate
>     the election committee items on the floor, particularly the five
>     or six or so proposals that I think are going to cause our
>     candidates legal problems or open them to challenges.  As for the
>     Constitutional proposals, I will post any committee member
>     comments to Mr. Moellman’s constitutional proposals along with his
>     constitutional proposals provided they are received by this coming
>     Saturday, February 2.
>
>  5. As for Operating Rules, I am going to ask that we meet in person
>     to take those up.  I checked the Frankfort Library, but it is
>     booked the next two Saturdays.  I have a large conference room at
>     my offices if Joey, John, and Mark, in particular, do not mind the
>     drive to Northern Kentucky.  I will buy lunch for all if the three
>     of you are agreeable to that.  I would propose Saturday the 9^th ,
>     or Saturday the 16^th , but I can also do Friday the 8th.  I also
>     have AV capability in my conference room.  My intent on those is
>     for this committee to hash out what Operating Rules we can agree
>     on.  And, if we can’t get to a majority agreement on a particular
>     section, to move the particular subject matter to the end of the
>     report with a placeholder in the report, so that it can be taken
>     up later (or hashed out on the floor).
>
> -Chris
>

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