User talk:ElectionJune2015/Referenda/4

Quorum

Article 36 states that the Council quorum shall correspond to a simple majority of members, which we have interpreted as 'voting members', since the Managing Editor is a member but cannot currently vote. If we leave it, that would mean that the quorum would now by three out of four, which could make it more difficult to conduct business. John Stephenson (talk) 18:35, 6 June 2015 (UTC)

• To allay that, the Council Chair will contact each member to remind them to participate in the business at hand as a quorum is needed to conduct business. Also the Chair will propose adding two additional members of the Council who are willing to commit to participating actively in Council business. Anthony.Sebastian (talk) 20:07, 6 June 2015 (UTC)

Charter

Changing the powers and privileges of the ME is to change the charter -- especially since referendum grants the ME voting rights on the Council. This referendum changes how the council is constituted and how the Council is constituted is defined by the charter. I don't think this has been properly explained on the referendum page. Russell D. Jones (talk) 16:37, 17 June 2015 (UTC)

The Charter doesn't appear to rule out granting the ME an ex-officio non-voting seat (the current system), but there is the wording of 25.4.3, which states that in the event that membership falls below a quorum (elsewhere stated as a simple majority), that "the Managing Editor shall fill one seat on a temporary basis as a voting member". That does imply that the ME is normally a non-voter, though this isn't totally explicit. It could be read as giving the ME two votes, which would probably be controversial, but the Charter doesn't state that the ME shall not be a member.

Also, there is no rule to say that, in the event that a non-Charter referendum is judged to modify the Charter, it can't be switched to Charter-modifying status if it's passed with the two-thirds requirement. John Stephenson (talk) 17:31, 17 June 2015 (UTC)

Amend the Charter?

This referendum was submitted as non-Charter modifying but was passed with more than a two-thirds majority, which is required to modify the Charter. As there doesn't appear to be anything in the rules that prevents us from switching the status of a passed referendum with two-thirds support, perhaps the points could simply be added to the Charter, even though that introduces something of a contradiction (see above). John Stephenson (talk) 11:06, 23 June 2015 (UTC)