ANA overhauls bylaws

This article was originally printed in Numismatic News.
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The American Numismatic Association board of governors might have heard from employee Ryanne Scott that the organization was now moving boldly into the new social media fields of Twitter, Facebook and special apps for telephones for use during conventions, but the board was very much focused on old-fashioned matters at its March 18 meeting during the National Money Show in Sacramento, Calif.

Much of the board’s time was spent reviewing a new set of proposed bylaws to completely replace the current set, of which legal counsel Ron Sirna said he could not be completely sure that the organization had a fully up-to-date copy.

General board agreement was disrupted only twice by close 5-4 votes.

The more contentious of the two contested issues was whether Young Numismatist members ages 13-17 should be allowed to vote in the biennial elections. The new bylaws require members to be 18 to vote, a change from current practice.

Board member Scott Rottinghaus proposed an amendment that would have set the age bar at 13. As he noted, he was once a YN and he thought they were fully capable of exercising sound judgment.

Chairman of the bylaws committee Doug Andrews said 18 was the age at which voting and other legal rights were conferred by society and the committee sought to conform with the societal norm.

Sirna said YN’s cannot legally sign a contract, a parent had to consent to his or her joining the ANA and it might prove a handicap in any legal proceeding in a disputed election if a court judge is told that YN’s are participating in the election of board members.

When the vote came, Rottinghaus was joined by Wendell Wolka, Walter Ostromecki and Tom Hallenbeck.

Opposed to YN’s ages 13-17 voting were Jeff Garrett, Joe Boling, J.P. Martin and Alan Herbert.

Casting the tie-breaking vote was President Clifford Mishler.

The voting age in the new bylaws stays at 18.

The other issue was what kind of nominations were required for a candidate to be put on the election ballot in the first place. The new bylaws say you need 25 nominations from either individuals or clubs in any combination.

Governor Walter Ostromecki felt that since this language meant that nominees could be successful without a single club nomination that at least one of 25 nominations should be from a club.

Garrett, Martin and Hallenbeck agreed with Ostromecki, but Boling, Wolka, Rottinghaus, Garrett and Mishler voted to leave the new language unchanged.

Once the review of the new bylaws was completed, the board voted to publish the new set in the July issue of The Numismatist. This will then allow the board to adopt the new bylaws at the August board meetings at the World’s Fair of Money in Chicago.

In another employee presentation, the board was told by Barbara Gregory that a special 256-page issue of The Numismatist was planned to highlight the Chicago convention. The cover date will be June.

Almost no time was spent on the budget. A hand-out showed that it is nearly balanced. The deficit from operations is $58,588.77. When noncash items were included, that was reduced to $22,09.26.