Rotary Rules! Dennis shows us the future
Posted on Aug 30, 2016
It could have been boring.
But it wasn’t, thanks to the presentation by our very own Dennis Shore – with
- pictures as well as words;
- anecdotes as well as facts; and
- insights into our club and District, rather than just generalities.
Dennis was telling us about the Rotary International Council on Legislation
- Every 3 years
- Held in Chicago
- 10 – 15 April 2016
- 700 attendees from 535 Rotary Districts around the world
- RI top brass present, but not allowed to vote!
- 15 months in preparation
- 117 enactments (constitutional changes) and Resolutions (recommendations) submitted for consideration
With terabytes of electronics, huge screens, coloured cards to show, and tons of paper (the paperwork – on top of the electronic stuff - was a fat lever arch file!), there was still a role for lots of old fashioned speaking.
Indeed, Dennis (on behalf of our District 9800) proposed a seemingly minor proposal to adjust the punctuation to render a current rule intelligible. That passed (even though 40 voted against it – but why?) and – along the way – sparked useful discussion on a wider topic.
Dennis highlighted two major changes that could affect any Club directly:
- Can now meet fortnightly
- Can now have rules to allow exotic types of membership.
Here was the huge backroom of Rotary at work. Thanks, Dennis, for showing us something of the process.