update on ByLaws vote

[Léo Washburn]

We have 30 in favor and zero against.

We need 12 more. If you haven't voted yet, please do it. Let us know if you have a problem getting into the members section or other problem with voting.

Thank you!!
Léo

[Mandy Katasse]

While I have alreqdy voted, it shouldn't be a tally ongoing of "this many said yes" as that puts pressure on people and influences the vote unfairly. 

Think about it.

Mandy

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[Lark]

While I have already voted, I realize that knowing how many have voted is needed as a reminder that a lot of work went into getting those bylaws changes to the membership. 

A “magic” number of votes are needed to validate that work. 

Think about it.

Sent from my iPhone

On Oct 23, 2025, at 8:14 AM, Mandy Katasse <bale...@gmail.com> wrote:



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[Léo Washburn]

I want - and I know other board members want - the membership to be involved in club business. That would include listening to criticism of how things are being done. 

The goal in reporting the results as they happened was not to discourage folks. Just the opposite.

Reporting how votes are leaning is a common practice in most elections. I am informed enough to know that some pundits believe it discourages folks from voting altogether. I've also heard it argued that it can have the opposite effect. We have enough protest votes in regular elections (nothing associated with our club as far as I am aware) to know that human nature includes voting even when the feeling is they won't "win" but want their opinion recorded. I sincerely believe if someone wanted to vote "no" they would. 
If anyone wishes to vote "no" understand that it's still open. I will try to remember to announce when it's about to close to give folks the chance to vote at the last minute.

Lark is correct. There was a lot of work in getting the bylaws updated. Anyone was welcome to attend the committee meetings. I only sat in on one of their meetings but I was impressed by how hard they were working and how thoughtful they were about them. 
There was also a period where folks could ask questions about them. 

I believe the membership consists of individuals who care about the breed. I also believe they are intelligent enough not to be influenced by the votes of others if they had genuine concerns about the bylaws or anything else we vote on.
It goes without saying that our membership is also made of people who are busy. 
We have a high bar of 2/3 of the membership agreeing to the bylaws as written for them to be passed. In elections for the president of the US, getting that much of a turnout total is impressive. To have 2/3 of the entire voting population vote for one candidate simply doesn't happen. 

We also have had some folks who had a harder time using the website to vote. A few even thought they had, but their vote was not recorded because they weren't logged in. This is more of a concern to me, and we will be figuring out how things can be improved so everyone has an easier time in the future, if that is possible.

So, one of the board members, our web person, and I tried to make sure everyone felt supported and heard as far as voting. I really don't think anyone was influenced to vote in any way that was against their conscience. 
Most folks thanked us for helping them with the process. 

Thankfully, we don't have this kind of thing very often, where the threshold for voting one way or the other is so high. 

If anyone has anything else to suggest, please feel free to do so. If you haven't yet voted, please do so. Your opinion matters.

Respectfully,
Léo Washburn
Secretary

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[mary joyce]

I think the new bylaws try to use the phrase "secret ballot" or "secret vote" in several places. To me, the essence of a secret vote is upheld when reminders are "we need x number of votes for 2/3 response, and so far we still need at least # more votes to reach the 2/3 threshold" and not a mention of yes or no so far. I'm not sure what I think about announcing the final tally if all that really matters is passage. But what I do think for sure is that we needed those vote reminders (thank you!) and we needed the backend website support (thank you!) and we're on the way to next step (thank you!). Doing a happy dance for all the work so far.

Mary

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[Léo Washburn]

Mary,
For a minute I thought I had misunderstood the 2/3 requirement...

I just found this in an email from Mark who was on the committee:
We "need 2/3 of the club to vote yes on them (for them to be passed)."

If I had said: "still need at least # more votes to reach the 2/3 threshold" it would have essentially been the same as saying we have this many yeses. 

Unless someone is having a bad math day, which I admit I do have from time to time. (2/3 of 70 is 47, not 42. At least I caught it, I guess.)

Léo

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