Parliamentary Procedure

HILLEGASS-PARKER RULES OF PARLIAMENTARY PROCEDURE

Approved as an amendment to HiP House Policies by council on June 01, 2014

I. MOTIONS

MAIN MOTIONS:

• • Motions must be submitted to the house president no later than 48 hours prior to the start of the scheduled house council meeting.

  • The person submitting the motion must have two co-sponsors (besides themselves) to support the motion identified at the time the motion is submitted.

  • Proposals need to be written with enough detail that they could, in theory, be approved and enacted immediately without requiring further drafting or elaboration.

  • Per existing house policy, Any non-manager who proposes more than 2 motions per semester that involve the imposition of a fine will themselves be fined $20. Any manager who proposes more than 3 motions per semester that impose fines will also be fined $20.

LATE MOTIONS:

• • Late motions (motions not submitted in time to be included in the council agenda) must be briefly and objectively presented to and approved by council for addition to the present agenda; only then may any debate, dissent, advocacy, or otherwise subjective deliberation be offered regarding the item; late motions that fail to gain approval as agenda items may not be otherwise acted on during the present council..

  • Motions requesting changes—or binding clarification of—existing house policy or house by-laws must be submitted as main motions and cannot be considered as late motions. Motions aiming to influence governing policies or documents of the house must be written and submitted no later than 48 hours prior to the scheduled start of council and distributed to the house as part of the council agenda, in accordance with the procedure for main motions.

SUBSIDIARY MOTIONS:

Subsidiary motions may be proposed during the discussion of a main motion or approved late motion. Subsidiary motions, defined below, provide the opportunity to change the substance of the motion under consideration, expedite debate over the motion, or delay further deliberation until a subsequent house council meeting.

Motion to Amend:

Motions to amend are attempts by members to modify the main motion being considered; a successful amendment requires either the friendly acceptance of the main motion's primary sponsor or, if the amendment is not 'friendly', approval of the amendment by a simple majority of council.

A successful motion to amend is incorporated into the main motion, and the revised version of the main motion is then voted on by council (barring a subsequent parliamentary disruption, such as a successful motion to table or a failure to satisfy quorum at the time of voting).

Members may amend a motion's substance by adding, by striking, or by striking and adding (effectively: substituting) specific portions of language from the main motion.

The most important principle governing substantive motions to amend is that amendments “may be hostile, but it must be germane.” In other words, proposed amendments can certainly be designed to work against the spirit or aim of the original motion's initial intent; however, substantive motions to amend must absolutely be relevant to the subject of that primary motion in order to be entertained.

A motion to amend must receive a 'second' from at least two council attendees (who possess voting privileges) before it is brought to a vote.

If the sponsor of the original motion is 'friendly' to the amendment's proposed revisions, the main motion is immediately revised without requiring a vote by council or the support of additional co-sponsors.

As with all subsidiary motions, motions to amend are dealt with immediately, in the order that they arise, and must be resolved entirely (i.e. approved, disapproved, or withdrawn) before the chair may return attention back to the main motion at hand.

Members who wish to amend a motion may, at any time, signal this intention to the chair by raising an arm and giving the 'thumbs up' hand gesture correlated to subsidiary motions (see section IV below). The member, once recognized, must state their desire to amend the main motion, and effectively articulate the nature of the amendment in precise terms to the chair.

The chair is to recognize and fully entertain all subsidiary motions above other hand-signals for parliamentary participation (see section IV below).

Motion to Table:

A successful motion to table promptly ends council's consideration of the main motion for the remainder of the session. The tabled motion may be offered again at a subsequent meeting of house council. When a motion to table is offered it is not debatable and it triggers an immediate vote by house council. A successful motion to table requires approval by a two-thirds majority. Each member may offer a motion to table only once during consideration of a particular motion. Members who wish to table a motion must signal that intention to the chair by raising an arm and giving a 'thumbs up' hand gesture. The chair is to recognize and fully entertain this and all other subsidiary motions above the other hand-signals for parliamentary participation (see section IV below).

Motion to Cap the Speakers' List:

Approval of this motion by a simple majority ensures an end to debate after the current list of speakers (maintained by the chair) is exhausted. No member may add her/himself to the speakers' list once this motion is approved. No member may transfer her/his 'spot' on the list to another individual after this motion has been accepted. This motion triggers an automatic vote, is not debatable, and requires approval by a simple majority. Members who wish to cap the speakers' list must signal that intention to the chair by raising an arm and giving a 'thumbs up' hand gesture. The chair is to recognize and fully entertain this and all other subsidiary motions above the other hand-signals for parliamentary participation (see section IV below).

II. INFORMAL CONSIDERATIONS

Overview

An informal consideration is an agenda item that the sponsoring house members regard as too intricate, lengthy, and/or important for a mere mention during Member Announcements, but one that is, as of yet, too premature/underdeveloped to warrant the binding action of council that accompanies consideration of a formulated motion.

Procedures

Informal considerations, like main motions, must be submitted to the House President 48 hours prior to the council in question; however, an informal consideration submitted by a member only requires one co-sponsor (in addition to the primary sponsor) in order to be placed on the agenda.

Presidents have the authority to include informal consideration topics in the agenda without a requisite, additional co-sponsor, so long as consideration of the topic falls reasonably within the purview of the president's official duties (as defined by the Hillegass-Parker House By-laws).

Informal considerations are limited to five minutes of discussion; discussion may be extended by a majority of council, once the initial time has expired. Informal considerations should be placed before Motions on the agenda, and after Member Announcements (normally, immediately after Manager Announcements).

Examples

Examples of informal consideration topics include “Should we reopen the free-pile?” “How should the storage of returning members' personal items be handled during summer?” etc...

III. VOTING

Voice Vote

Used when the Chair believes that there are only a few objections to the motion; a voice vote that renders ambiguity must trigger an immediate hand-vote..

Hand Vote

If a voice vote is unclear, any member may call for an immediate hand-vote; if a single member requests a hand vote, one must be taken by the chair . Each member counts for one vote (this includes central-level boarders with active boarding contracts).

Per central level policy, all votes that have any impact on a discretionary budget—no matter how seemingly trivial—must be taken as hand-votes; additionally, the precise numbers of members voting for, against, and abstaining must be recorded in the minutes.

IV. GENERAL PROCEDURES FOR COUNCIL PARTICIPATION

Subsidiary Motions

Members who wish to have a subsidiary motion entertained by the chair must signal that intention to the chair by raising an arm and giving a 'thumbs up' hand gesture (see section I above)

Claw the Question

During consideration of a main motion, if a member believes enough debate has occurred s/he may “claw the question” by evoking the correlated 'clawing' hand motion toward the chair. Any member at any time may claw the question; the chair will then ask if there are any objections to ending discussion and voting. If there are any objections at all, discussion is then resumed. If there are no objections, an additional 'seconding' member must also claw the question before a vote can proceed. An attempt by a member to 'claw the question' carries the same highest parliamentary priority as subsidiary motions.

Points of Information

A point of information is a non-biased, brief, informative statement by a member during council intended to clarify or correct the present conversation. Council attendees may gesture to the chair with a single, raised index-finger to indicate that they have a Point of Information to offer. Points of Information take precedent over Questions and Comments, but do not take precedent over subsidiary motions or attempts to claw the question.

Questions

A question is a non-rhetorical interrogatory statement regarding the present topic of conversation; questions may be directed toward the chair, the speaker, or any other council attendee with knowledge of the subject at hand. A single, hooked index-finger (like a question-mark) indicates that a council attendee wishes to ask a question. Questions take precedent over comments, but do not take precedent over points of information, subsidiary motions, or attempts to claw the question.

Comments

A Comment is a non-interrogatory statement; council attendees may gesture to the chair by raising their arm and curling their hand in the shape of a 'C' to indicate that they would like to make a Comment. Comments have the lowest priority on the speakers' list.

Good Point Giraffe

Should any member, at any time, believe that the present speaker has made a particularly astute or otherwise commendable statement, that member may express this laudatory opinion by—silently—raising an arm (as well as its attached hand) vertically into the air, and using the hand to mimic a giraffe's head looking back-and-forth across the room. This gesture, known as 'good point giraffe', is a self-contained form of communication; unlike the other member-participation hand-signals above, it does not provide the member with an additional right to speak at any point during council.

Irrelevant-elephant

Should any member, at any time, find that the present speaker has wandered unproductively away from the topic under consideration, the member may express this opinion to the chair by—silently—extending an arm and using it to mimic the gesticulations of an exuberant elephant's trunk to the best of that member's abilities. This gesture, known as 'irrelevant-elephant', is a self-contained form of communication; like 'good point giraffe', it does not provide the member with an additional right to speak at any point.

Direct-responses

Direct-responses (that is, individuals wishing to respond directly and immediately to an individual speaker) are not permitted at council; in theory and in practice, direct-responses trump the speakers' list and promote unduly exclusive conversational dialogues. Direct responses are therefore not conducive to effective parliamentary procedure as they discourage and inhibit the democratic engagement of the full membership.

V. ELECTIONS STANDARDS

The process used to elect any and all house management positions (which are defined in the “Appendix” to the Hillegass-Parker House Bylaws) must—at a minimum—include provisions to provide for the following:

1. A guarantee of the complete anonymity of all participating voters.

2. A guarantee that only members with current voting rights are able to vote.

3. A guarantee that no individual has the capacity to vote more than once.

4. After the votes are tallied and results released, the ability of any voter to verify that her/his specific votes were duly counted and included in the election's results (while still preserving the voter's anonymity).

5. The ability of all voters to see the mechanism used to tally the votes, and the exact number of votes for each individual/position (while, again, preserving universal anonymity).

6. Conformance with all additional stipulations pertaining to elections and voting as defined by our house bylaws and council approved policies, including, but not limited, to section 5 of the Hillegass-Parker House Bylaws, which reads:

“Elections of managers are by secret ballot. Each voter ranks the candidates running for the position. Candidates can be ranked equally to indicate that they are equally preferred. Not all have to be ranked; ranked candidates are considered preferred to unranked candidates. "None of the above" can be ranked as though it were a candidate; if it wins, no one is elected and a new election is held later. Ballots are tabulated using the Schulze method. If a computer program is used to tabulate ballots, the source code and the input given to it for each election must be available to any interested house member.”

VI. ADDITIONAL DEFINITIONS AND PARLIAMENTARY PROCEDURES

The term chair as used in this document should—under normal circumstances—be considered synonymous with the current HiP House President. Occasionally, due to an absence or for other considerations, a House President may designate another individual to act as the chair of a meeting/council for a portion of time or for the entire meeting/council in question.

All additional matters of parliamentary procedure—unless addressed by this document, by HiP council-approved policies, or by the Hillegass-Parker House Bylaws—are to conform with the tenants and instructions found in The Standard Code of Parliamentary Procedure, fourth edition¹.

[1] Sturgis, Alice. The Standard Code of Parliamentary Procedure (Fourth Edition). New York: McGraw-Hill Professional Book Group, 2000.