Club Business

This email was distributed on behalf of Todd Putz. Of note, the Nominating Committee will, once again, begin keeping formal minutes of proceedings. If you recall last year the committee rewrote its own charter to avoid keeping minutes. I'm happy Todd is correcting this.

Shockingly, the committee will continue to put forth ONLY ONE member per open BOD seat. The existence of the Nominating Committee and the fact that it will continue to actively restrict member choice represents leadership blindness. Is the committee ignoring the membership survey? This policy undermines the very essence of member-elected leadership. The committee continues to justify this decision by claiming that, without it, members may not run against one another for fear of "someone's feelings getting hurt". This is patently absurd logic in any election, whether it be for a high school student council or a financially struggling club with less than 35% leadership approval rate. There are members, highly qualified people, who have tried to run but were shut out or actively thwarted by the committee. Jim Woodward is one of them.

Notice that there is no clear method to get appointed to the nominating committee? The board may not appoint them, so who does? This group of nine invididuals impact governance at its root and there's no clear undestanding of how the committee itself is selected.

A few other comments:

1. No former presidents should sit on the committee. None. To avoid cronyism, all former presidents should recuse themselves immediately. There is no legitimate reason to delay this until after the 2024 election.

2. No member who has a private financial interest in club projects, such as the cottages etc, should sit on the nominating committee and put forth candidates.

3. No bona-fide Haig Point member should be required to submit applications, background checks or disclosure information prior to being considered. This includes restrictive NDAs. All Haig Point members have already been vetted, and any good standing member is already qualified to at least appear on the ballot.

4. The BOD nominees should represent an accurate % of memberhip tiers at the Club. In other words, the BOD nominees should not be comprised of 100% signature golf members when this does not accurantely represent the club's membership growth trajectory.

Todd left this bit out. As a reminder to all members- the bylaws permit ANYONE in good standing to run for the board and it only requires 10 signatures. In the pursuit of choice I will happily sign any petition put forth (so you only need 9!).

(c) Any Property Owner meeting the qualifications set forth in Section 1 of this Article IV may, within thirty (30) days of the posting of the notice of the Nominating Committee’s nominees and solicitation of additional nominees, place or allow such Property Owner’s name to be placed in nomination by filing with the Association Secretary a nomination, to include brief biographical information and qualifications of the nominee, together with evidence of the support of the candidacy by at least ten (10) other Property Owners, which may be in the form of a signed petition or letters of support (which may be submitted via facsimile or email). The support of any person nominating, or signature of any person supporting a candidate, as one (1) of the required ten (10) signatories, shall not be counted if such person is delinquent in the payment of any dues, assessments, charges or fees owed to Association. 

Fellow Members:

We are now halfway through the year, and I want to update you on some important changes the Nominating Committee is making in response to Member feedback.  Also included is a brief overview of our process and our intended timeframe for the balance of 2023.

ENHANCEMENTS TO NOMINATING COMMITTEE PROCESS

The Nominating Committee has spent the last two months discussing all the feedback provided by the Members through the annual survey and the listening sessions.  Considering Member input and best practices, we are implementing several changes to improve transparency and enhance our standing within the Haig Point community.  Here is a summary of each change:

• We will publish minutes for all our meetings (effective February 2023)

• We will move to only one past President on the committee (effective January 2024)

• We will expand the size of the Nominating Committee to nine members in total

• The Club President (our Board liaison) will only attend meetings when invited to provide general input regarding the current needs for the Board

• Every Board candidate that we consider will complete the required application and disclosure information prior to beginning the Nominating Committee evaluation process

• All candidates (including any petition candidates) will be given time at the Meet the Candidates session to express why they are interested in serving on the Board

• We will proactively solicit topics from the Membership to discuss with each candidate during our evaluation and interview process, and at the Meet the Candidates session

• The ballot will eliminate the single check box for the nominated slate

For the 2024 Board Election (conducted in December 2023), we will nominate one individual for each of the two open seats.  We will seek to find candidates who have varied experiences, professions, and backgrounds that will enhance the Board through perspectives and differing opinions.  Using our rigorous vetting process, we will select and recommend the candidates that best meet the needs of the Club, Community and Board at this time.  Rest assured that we will conduct background checks, ask all the hard questions each of you would ask, and conduct our evaluations at the same high level you would. 

We strongly feel that in our close-knit community the price we all would pay to have more than one nominated candidate per open seat would be much too high.  Finding highly qualified Members that are both ready and willing to serve, and possess the leadership skills to be effective, is no easy task.  Finding twice as many as needed is significantly more difficult.  Many who would otherwise serve, decline to be a candidate if required to run against a fellow Member.  In addition, once the election is over, it is highly unlikely that anyone who does not win will ever run again.  Losing very capable individuals from our pool of potential candidates is a very high price to pay.  Also, multi-candidate elections have the potential to create other unintended consequences in the community.  For these reasons, we are hopeful that our Members will support our decision to nominate only one person for each open Board seat.

NOMINATING COMMITTEE ACTIVITIES FOR BALANCE OF 2023

Between now and the end of the year, we have quite a bit to accomplish.  We want to be sure we have a strong list of potential candidates to begin our vetting process.  We will seek recommendations from all our Committee Chairs for anyone serving on their respective committees that we should consider.  We also welcome suggestions from our Members.  Therefore, between now and July 31st, please feel free to pass along suggestions you have to any member of the Nominating Committee.  To help you with this part, the competencies that we are looking for in a potential Board candidate include:

• Demonstrated successful Haig Point Committee participation

• Proven leadership skills and the ability to operate in a matrix organization

• Broad-based business acumen

• Ability to prioritize issues and make sound business decisions

• Passion to focus on the strategic issues, not day-to-day operational issues

• Willingness to make the hard decisions that are in the best interest of Haig Point

• Ability to provide oversight and hold management accountable

• Have a broad and thoughtful perspective that would benefit Haig Point

August 1st to September 5th:  we will collect all applications from potential candidates.   Also, Members should provide their suggestions for topics to cover during the evaluation process.

October 2nd:  we will post and email to Members the list of the nominated candidates.

October 16th:  we request that any petition candidate notify us of their intent to run.

November 1st:  is the deadline for any petition candidate to submit required package of materials.

November 16th:  the Meet the Candidates session will be held at 4 PM at the Clubhouse.

November 17th to December 21st:  the election will be open for Members to vote. 

We hope that you find this information helpful, and you have a better understanding of everything we are doing to ensure we get the best leadership for Haig Point.  We are all neighbors and friends, and we want the same thing from our Board that you do.  We take our job very seriously and appreciate the support and confidence you have shown in us these past few years as we have worked to improve the function of the Nominating Committee.  As always, we are interested in your thoughts and suggestions, so please reach out to any of us:  Tim Engram, Amy Evans, Donna Galateria, Tim Nolan, Todd Putz, Bill Tait, Carl Walter, or Jane Winslow.   

On behalf of the Nominating Committee,

Todd Putz, Chair