Linux Users' Group of Davis
Bylaws
Article I: Officers and Elections
Section 1: Elected Officers
All of the duties listed below, and elsewhere in these bylaws, are
listed only to make sure they all get done.
It is only the duty of the officer in question to make
sure somebody does it.
i: root (Chairperson) is the glue that keeps it all together. She/he
tries to keep LUGOD on track. The duties of the root shall include:
a: To be the primary signatory
b: To set the agenda for meetings
c: To act as chair of the meetings
d: To oversee the committees by keeping in regular contact with the
committee chairs
e: To check the PO Box at least once for each meeting.
ii: sys (Vice Chair) does all the stuff that keeps LUGOD running. The
duties of sys shall include:
a: Making preparations for the meeting, including coordinating the
advertising, reservations, setup of any necessary equipment, and
with the guest speakers.
b: To take over the duties of any officers that may be absent, or
to arrange for someone else to.
iii: /dev/null (Treasurer) keeps track of money, bills, expenses, and
financial matters. The duties of /dev/null shall include:
a: Passing the collection plate and presenting a current financial
report toward the end of the meeting.
b: Coordinating with the webmaster/mistress to regularly update the
financial report on the website.
c: To keep track of the other key for the PO Box.
d: To be responsible for LUGOD's taxes and interactions with the IRS.
iv: typescript (Secretary) does all the managerial and logistical work.
The duties of typescript shall include:
a: To take the minutes at meetings, and coordinate with the
webmistress/master to have them made available at the website.
b: To conduct elections for officership and Constitutional and Bylaw
amendments.
c: To maintain a listing of members, by circulating an attendance
sheet at meetings.
Section 2: Appointed Officers
The following officerships are appointed by root. Aside from being
appointed, all other bylaws relating to officers apply.
Appointed officers shall not be construed as legal agents of LUGOD, and
are not authorized to bind LUGOD into financial or contractual
obligations of any sort.
i: The Webmistress/Webmaster designs and updates the webpage. The
duties of the webmistress/master shall include:
a: to be responsible for the 'look and feel' of the
website, www.lugod.org.
b: to coordinate hosting matters with an ISP, including hosting
the LUGOD mailing lists.
c: to add materials provided by the other officers and committee
Chairs to the website.
ii: The LERT Coordinator is responsible for:
a: Being the point of contact for requests for LERT assistance, and
assigning an appropriate LERT member to help with the request.
b: Collecting signed waivers and making sure the checks go to
/dev/null.
c: Summarizing bi-weekly LERT activities at general meetings.
d: Advertising for "business" and new LERT members, and making sure
LERT membership is up to date.
iii: The Demo and Public Outreach Officer is responsible for our
public demonstration and outreach programs, including:
a: Organizing demonstrations and public events, including compiling
lists of who's attending what, when and where.
b: Making sure these events get posted to the LUGOD webpage.
c: Keeping the LUGOD demonstration machine, including all sysadm
duties:
d: Being in charge of organizing carpooling to events and meetings.
iv: The Publicity Officer is responsible for advertising and promoting
LUGOD events, including but not limited to: regularly scheduled
meetings, installfests, Linux demos, lunchnixes and officer meetings.
v: The Installfest Officer
a: is responsible for coordinating the Installfests and making the
run on a smooth and regular basis.
b: is in charge of physical and network security during Installfests.
vi: The Mailing List Officer is responsible for:
a: Making sure the mailing lists function smoothly.
b: Instituting and enforcing policy and rules of the LUGOD mailing
lists
c: Keeping spam and unwanted mailings away from the mailing lists
and the officer mail addresses.
d: Fostering an environment where people can feel safe in asking
questions and participating in discussions in good faith without
fear of getting flamed.
Section 3: Abdication
In the event that an officer is unable to continue in their
position, it would be greatly appreciated if they would give the
rest of the officers notice at least one meeting beforehand, so that
nominations and elections for a replacement can be made. In the event
that this is not feasible, the officer should find a replacement to be
the acting officer until elections can be held. Any help the outgoing
officer can offer in transitioning their replacement would also be
appreciated. If an officer doesn't come to three meetings in a row
without informing anyone, they will be considered to have abdicated,
and nominations will be opened immediately for a replacement.
Section 4: Elections for Officership and Transition
Nominations for elected officerships will be opened at the first
general meeting of October, and will remain open
until the beginning of the election at the next meeting.
You are allowed to nominate yourself and nominations do not need to be
seconded. A person nominated for an officer position may decline the
nomination at any time before the election takes place.
Elections for elected officerships will be held the meeting after
nominations are opened. Voting is to be anonymous. In the case where
a candidate runs unopposed, typescript may ask that their approval for
officership be passed by consent. If there is an objection to consent,
the candidate must be approved by a 2/3 majority of a general meeting.
If no candidate is elected for a position, nominations will be re-opened
for that position until the next meeting, when a new election will be
held, and so forth, as necessary until all positions are filled.
A newly-elected officer's term shall commence at the beginning of the
meeting after elections are over.
Article II: Procedures
Section 1: Bylaws Location
The bylaws shall be publicly posted on LUGOD's website.
Section 2: Amendment of the Bylaws
Anyone can bring up an amendment to the bylaws at any time. The
amendment will be addressed during the discussion period of the meeting.
In the absence of objection to voting, a vote will take place
immediately. Otherwise voting will take place at the next meeting.
A 2/3 majority will pass the amendment.
Section 3: sudo
A bylaw may be temporarily suspended with the consent of root, sys,
and at least one other elected officer. The officers are strongly
cautioned against abuse of this power; if tempted to use it more
than once for the same thing, consider amending the bylaws.
Section 4: Small Change Clause
Root and sys are allowed to make small changes to the bylaws. The scope
of these changes is defined by:
i: Spelling, punctuation, formatting and change of wording are always
fair game as long as it doesn't change the general meaning of the
bylaw being changed.
ii: Minor additions and deletions will need to be brought to an informal
vote by all the officers (majority wins) to see if the change is
minor enough to implement without a general LUGOD vote.
iii: Anything else needs to be brought to a general vote at a regularly
scheduled LUGOD meeting.
Article III: Meetings
Section 1: When and Where
Meetings will be held at least once per month, in the evening.
Meeting dates will be agreed upon by root and sys at least one month
in advance. If a large number of members have an objection to the
date of a meeting, root and sys may opt to choose a different date, but
this should ideally be taken care of prior to the publication of
announcements and the agenda. The location should also be agreed upon
by root and sys, based on input by the membership, and listed in the
agenda.
Section 2: Parliamentary Procedure
Meetings shall be conducted according to Robert's Rules of Order (New
Revised) Edition, except where superseded by these Bylaws or the
Constitution. root may abridge these procedures for the purpose of
expediting meetings. Motions shall, in general, not require
a second, and root should first try to pass them by consent if that
seems likely to succeed.
Section 3: Agenda
i: The tentative agenda should be sent to the vox-announce mailing list
by root or his designee at least a week prior to the meeting. The
agenda may of course be amended by root before the meeting, and items
may be added by a motion during the meeting.
ii: The meeting shall commence with an Introduction of all members. New
members are invited to tell us a little about themselves. This
shall be followed by Announcements and New Business. Then each
committee's chair will provide a report, if necessary, and each
report will be discussed by the members as a whole. This will be
followed by an open Discussion Forum and the Collection of
voluntary member contributions. One dollar is the basic suggested
contribution. /dev/null will then provide the financial report.
The chair will then close the business section of the meeting and
introduce the guest speaker, if available.
Section 4: Attendance Issues
i: If an officer is unable to attend a meeting, sys shall take over
their responsibilities, or assist the officer in question with finding
an alternate stand-in. This second course is highly recommended, as
sys really has enough to do.
ii: If a committee chair is unable to attend, their report may be
presented by another committee member they designate, or presented
by root. In either case, they should provide a written report to vox
and/or typescript.
Article IV: Committees
Section 1: Formation
root may form a new committee at any time, by appointing a committee
chair.
Section 2: Committee Membership and Meetings
The committee chair is in charge of keeping track of his/her
committee's membership. Anyone may join any committee they like.
The committee chair may also call as many meetings as they feel are
necessary to get the job done, but is advised to make sure the members
that are interested can attend.
Section 3: Structural Change
If a committee chair doesn't feel up to the task, they should request
that root choose another person to chair the committee and resign. It
is the resigning committee chair's duty to brief and/or train their
replacement so as to make the transition as easy as possible.
Section 4: Dissolution
root may dissolve a committee at any time. It is recommended that
committees that have completed their assigned task, or whose task is
found to be unachievable, be dissolved. root's decision to dissolve a
commitee may be overruled by a majority vote either of LUGOD as a whole,
or of the committee's membership.
Article V: Events
Events shall be organized by a committee. Members attending the event
are requested to remember that they are representing LUGOD, and not behave
in a manner that may tarnish the club's image. People encountered in the
course of the event with differing views and differing OSes should be
treated with dignity and respect despite their somewhat questionable
tastes. Remember, LUGOD will not bail you out of jail, so please
cooperate with any relevant authority figures. Protests should be kept
off the property of the protestee and not block the entryway to their place
of business.
Article VI: Grievances
Anyone with a grievance against an officer, committee chair, another
member, or LUGOD as a whole is asked to first try to resolve the matter
informally with the person(s) involved. If this fails, however, they are
invited to institute a formal grievance during the discussion forum.
When instituting a formal grievance, it is advisable to write down all
facts (and feelings) pertinent to the grievance, as well as some possible
suggestions on how to resolve the grievance. Copies should be made for
the entire membership in attendance, if possible. Resolution of a grievance
will be done by the membership as a whole, but neither the person whom the
grievance is against nor the person instituting it shall be allowed to vote
on any motions involved in the resolution.
Article VII: LUGOD Emergency Response Team (LERT)
Anyone with technical difficulty running Linux is invited to post a
description of the problem to the vox mailing list. Anyone interested in
helping solve the problem is more than welcome to reply to the list, or
invite the poster to contact them for further assistance. Those who feel
they benefit greatly from this system are encouraged (but by no means
required) to make a voluntary contribution at the next meeting, in
whatever amount they feel is feasible and appropriate.
Modified: Tue Feb 1 19:53:56 PST 2011