Re: AERC BYLAw Changes

[luv2ride@peop.tds.net]

Just curious in asking this, but how many people are riding 5 yo in
100's?

D

> navion wrote:
> 
> AERC MEMBERS
> I just read the proposed bylaw changes on page 46 of the Oct 98 EN.
> Proposal #3 eliminates the age requirements in our BYLAWS. The reason
> stated for this is so the board can modify the age requirements
> without a vote of the membership.  If I were a cynical person (well
> maybe I am) then I would think the current AERC directors are making
> this change in response to their earlier attempt to
> make 6 the minimum age for 100 mile rides. This rule was changed about
> 1 year ago (pg 13 June 97 EN effective 1998) but then somebody (Dane?
> ,pg 14 Sept 97 EN) reminded the board that the age was also in thye
> BYLAWS and therefore could not be changed without a vote of the
> membership. I thought the proposed change in the bylaws making 6 the
> minimum age for 100's would be on the ballot clearly stated as such
> this fall or that the issue would remain unchanged. (Feb 98 EN pg 49
> possibly should have given me some warning since the board opposed
> putting it to a membership vote? The elected representatives don't
> trust the people's ability to make a decision? Why don't you want us
> to vote on this?)  But yet it appears to me that the board decided to
> slide around the issue in this manner.
>    Please tell me this isn't so? In this time of Bill Clinton I had
> hoped AERC would stay upfront and not resort to this kind of effort.
> If this change passes I would have to believe in short order the 6
> year old rule would go through since the board already passed it once
> before.  (As a reference pg 18 April 98 EN, Donna Snyder-Smith
> presents her argument for not riding any horse under 6 in a 100, I
> thought she was attempting to influence us to vote her way when the
> vote came. Then the next issue, May had an article written by Ray
> Randall DVM.  He also supported raising the age to 6 and ended the
> article with "It is time to take a serious look at raising the minimum
> age for starting 100 mile horses to six years.) These articles sure
> made me believe that we would vote on this issue with it clearly
> marked as such.
>    Then in EN Sept 98, pg 37, DSS moved from the education committee a
> proposal that we vote on the 6 yr rule for 100's. It was clearly
> written. The full board voted it down, I assumed the rule would remain
> unchanged.  Why did you not want the full membership to vote on this
> my riding friends, Stephanie, Ramey, Barbara, Mike, Terry? And the
> ones I have never met, Randy, Crockett, Stagg, Dean and the others
> whose first names I do not know by memory)
>   I am not stating an opinion on 6 yr old for 100's rule in any way. I
> just wish the board would have had the guts to let us vote on the
> issue instead of doing it this way.  Or if they claim it they didn't
> mean to attempt to bypass the issue then I think they need some
> guidance in how something like this would be perceived by some of the
> members. At least the cynical ones.
>    And of course maybe they won't change the rule, but since they
> thought they changed it over a year ago only to get stymied but the
> bylaws I don't see it that way.
>    I don't mean to inflame this issue here on an already burdened
> ridecamp but this vote leaves no time for discussions in EN. So
> although ridecamp is not the voice of AERC I know most of the
> directors are on here and I want to hear them say they do not plan on
> changing the age rule to 6 without a membership vote or that it was
> their intent to bypass us in this way.
> 
> 
>    I want to state I have been a supporter of board actions, I believe
> we elect then to serve us and I have always put faith in their
> decisions. I do rides with many of them and believe them all to be
> great and honest people. I did not jump on the last 2 executive
> director issues because I believed the board was right in keeping some
> privacy while they worked things out and I trusted their decisions. I
> have not criticized any other actions that I can remember. But this
> appears so blatant, intended or not.
> 
> Jim Mitchell
> AERC 13117
> PS  Thank you DSS, Maryben and the others who voted aye for attempting
> to let us vote on the subject.