Proposal: Strike the once-per-year limit per member for card access nominations

[Luis Montes]

This clause was added last year without member input. In my opinion it serves no positive purpose. Card access already requires at least 5 card members present and a majority vote to approve. We can always just vote no. There's no reason to cap how many nominations a member can make.

Change: Amend the Nomination / Proposal subsection under CARD ACCESS.

Strike:

"Members may only make "one" card access nomination per year. Example: If Member A nominates someone, whether it passes or not, Member A may not nominate another person for 12 months. If the card access proposal does not pass, it may be resubmitted as outlined in the "PROPOSAL PROCESS" section, except that there is no requirement for substantial changes to the proposal. Resubmission does not require a separate access nomination and does not count against a member's limit of 1 nomination per year."

Replace with:

"If the card access proposal does not pass, it may be resubmitted as outlined in the "PROPOSAL PROCESS" section, except that there is no requirement for substantial changes to the proposal."

Cost / resources: None.

Timeline: Effective immediately upon enactment.

-Luis

[Moheeb Zara]

Agreed, it was also added specifically to target and restrain one member. Rule never should have been there especially without discussion or community input. 

I'm fine with this proposal as is, but I am worried about how often we change our bylaws (in an effort to correct significant changes) because then we have to file that. It adds a burden and its not really something that should have to be changed often and doesnt look good in the paper work sense.

So I would almost rather you change this to a proposal to move everything card access related back to a process doc in the wiki including this change. Then the bylaws would just say "For facilities related access refer to the card access process document, which can only be amended by standard HYH process"

[Luis Montes]

I wanted to roll back everything to before the board's changes last year, but we added the requirement of member proposals for bylaw changes since then. I really don't want to lose that one, so I'm being very careful.

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[David Lang]

I was not here when the clause was added, but I have seen some people say that
the majority of new cardholders have been nominated by a very small pool of
people, and that it would be better if this was more spread out.

I also saw that when Brett was nominated, some people acted like it was a bad
thing that the person nominating them was a new cardholder

David Lang

[David Lang]

Moheeb Zara wrote:

> Agreed, it was also added specifically to target and restrain one member.
> Rule never should have been there especially without discussion or
> community input.
>
> I'm fine with this proposal as is, but I am worried about how often we
> change our bylaws (in an effort to correct significant changes) because
> then we have to file that. It adds a burden and its not really something
> that should have to be changed often and doesnt look good in the paper work
> sense.
>
> So I would almost rather you change this to a proposal to move everything
> card access related back to a process doc in the wiki including this
> change. Then the bylaws would just say "For facilities related access refer
> to the card access process document, which can only be amended by standard
> HYH process"

the only difference that would make is have an additional place to make changes
and make it so that the board would not also vote on changes to the cardholder
rules. It already requies the same HYH process either way.

David Lang

[Moheeb Zara]

It has for nearly two decades not been in the bylaws and we have been fine. It is common sense not to put things like that in bylaws, its absolutely insane that we have it in the bylaws. Bylaws should rarely be changed, something like HYH process and card access rules should be easily iterable. We don't need to federally update our paperwork each time we make a tweak to day to day process. 

Also it was changed to prevent Luis specifically from making more than one card access proposal. Instead of celebrating that he is around often enough to meet members to propose them for card access and therefore has made the most nominations. If the issue is not enough people are nominating people for card access the answer isnt to limit nominations. Its a ridiculous rule and its rooted in mistrust. I fully reject its entire premise. 

[Luis Montes]

We don't need a restriction added to ourselves for more people to nominate card holders. Any member can make a proposal.

We really don't need restrictions on things that require a vote anyway.   People can always vote no.

I think it was awesome that a new card holder nominated Brett.  Austin and Brett are have both contributed a lot to the lab already.

There's nothing saying someone that we collectively voted to trust with the place shouldn't nominate others.

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[Milton Williams]

I support this change to the bylaws. Here is why.

There was a group of us preCovid that actively watched for cool, contributing people to nominate for access. We nominated early and often. Many of the dedicated consistent hosts were nominated by that small group over a relatively short time. We were pretty vocal about what we were doing: growing the Lab, making it more welcoming, and installing the glue that keeps people coming to the Lab. That card is really important to making the Lab "sticky" for people. We didn't have any problems with these quick nominee people that were significant enough to stick in my memory. There are always a few bumps and sometimes some learning curve. I don't want to name names because I will miss someone, but there were many rock solid people that were given card access during this time that went on to be consistent hosts, board members, and really amazing volunteers. I do recall some complications during Covid with new cardholders, but that was a whole other issue related to us not being in the physical space together.

I asked Luis to nominate me for card access again, which knowing this is a rule now, gives me pause. I basically asked him to throw away his one for the year which I am not ok with. This might belong on the other thread, but it cross applies.

I am against any attitude or rule that makes extra barriers to card access and this current rule feels like an unnecessary complication. The bylaws say that the board can revoke card access at any time, it doesn't even say that there has to be a reason (a little concerning), so I think we have a safety net if a cardholder is a problem. 

[Luis Montes]

Thanks Milton, and Moheeb

Milton is exactly right.  I was about to nominate another long time member and I'd also like to nominate Milton, even though I don't feel he requires a new nomination.

Why are we putting up barriers for ourselves? We require proposals to pass by a majority, we don't need to restrict making proposals.

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[Eric Ose]

I support this proposal. It was always silly to add additional restrictions on proposals. This was part of a group of changes implemented without the community voting for it.

Eric Ose
Robot Ambassador

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[Michael Mathers]

It does not make sense to me that there is any validity to restricting how many nominations can be made by a "small pool of people" (or person).  People have itches and they scratch them -- and one of those itches for some is seeing that deserving people that volunteer and make the lab a better place get the opportunity to do that as much as they are able and willing to.  Enabling the enablers is a good thing.  The nomination has a vetting process in place already and appears to work reasonably well.  If there were an issue with a cardholder nominating inappropriate people it would be resolved here.  I have never seen anyone articulate an actual problem they are trying to solve with this restriction.

Michael