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The Foundation bylaws require that we have at least four officers |
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(president, vice president, secretary, and treasurer). They allow us to |
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have a chairman, vice chairman, and other vice presidents as needed. |
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(Bylaws, Article VI). All officers are selected by the Board. |
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Two of these officers have very specific duties: The chairman presides |
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at board meetings, and the vice chairman presides if the chairman is |
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absent. If we do not have these two officers appointed, then their |
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roles fall to the president and the vice president. |
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|
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However, the primary duties of the president and vice president are more |
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traditional: President is the Foundation's CEO and vice president acts |
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in the president's absence. And as we have seen in our efforts to set |
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up a bank account, some banks are interested in personal information |
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about these two officers. In at least one case, we were slowed down |
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because Roy happens to live in Scotland and he is the president. |
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If he had also been the Chairman, we could have named someone else as |
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president and avoided this difficulty. There would have been no other |
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effect on our operation because the Foundation officers act at the |
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direction of the board. Right now, Roy as president doesn't do anything |
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because the officers (not the board) have never met in executive |
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committee. |
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Further, as we continue to get the Foundation into shape as a |
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corporation, much of the activities now handled by the board seem to fit |
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better under the officers (e.g., the Gentoo store seems to fit under |
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"general and active management of the business and affairs of the |
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foundation", and that falls to the president as directed by the board). |
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|
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In anticipation of our continued success in moving forward, I propose |
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the following: Appoint Roy as Chairman of the Board as well as |
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president, and for completeness, appoint me as vice chair. This will |
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have no immediate effect at all, but will put us in position to split |
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off the Foundation officers from the board as it becomes more |
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appropriate. |
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|
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I propose one other change, which I'll add to the bylaws tracker. We |
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should require that the Chair and Vice Chair be trustees. The trustees |
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should retain control of their own operations. |
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|
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Comments please, |
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Regards, |
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Ferris |
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-- |
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Ferris McCormick (P44646, MI) <fmccor@g.o> |
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Developer, Gentoo Linux (Sparc, Userrel, Trustees) |
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