About

The CPB term for Reference states that CPB c-chairs are in place for a two-year period, and after this time, the CPB co-chairs need to be elected by the CPB members. The currently defined process requires formal voting on nominees and a supermajority of CPB members to approve each nominee.

This proposal simplifies the process, mainly where there are the same or fewer nominees than co-chair positions. In that scenario, we would expect all nominees to be accepted, provided there are no reasonable objections. This will allow the co-chairs to be accepted without a formal voting process.

The proposal also changes the election of co-chairs in a voting scenario to require only a majority of those voting.

A supermajority must approve changes to the current TOR process.

Common processes

• At the end of the March meeting, the current CPB Co-chairs resign.

• For the period 18th March to 22nd April (as applies in 2025), an ex-CPB co-chair will administer the group and processes decided by the (now) ex-co-chairs.

• There are three co-chair positions.

  • at any time a member can propose increasing the number of co-chairs:

    • This proposal should be posted to Discourse CPB channel

    • If no objections to this after 5 days then this will be accepted

    • If any objections the acting chair can decide on next steps

• Nominations are then accepted for a period of 2 weeks for the vacant co-chair positions.

• Nominations must be from the CPB membership itself.

• Nominees can be nominated or nominate themselves.

• Nominations are posted to the CPB Discourse channel by the nominee.

• After 2 weeks, nominations are closed.

Current process

The current process requires formal voting and could be operationalised as follows:

• The CPB are then invited to vote on the Nominees.

• This is done anonymously via Discourse Polls/Votes functionality.

• Nominees can vote for themselves.

• A supermajority of CPB members are required to approve a nomination.

• Not voting or otherwise abstaining will reduce the numbers needed for a supermajority. In other words the supermajority is only from those who voted.

• Two weeks is allowed for voting.

• At the subsequent CPB meeting on the 22nd of April, the new CPB co-chairs are announced, or any other outcome.

The difficulty with this process is that we may not receive more than three nominations, and we would really like to fill three co-chair posts to help manage the CPB. A formal vote seems unnecessary and excessive if we have three or fewer nominations.

Proposed process

We propose changing the process as below:

• If there are more nominees than positions, a formal vote will be taken as per the Current Process but:

  • The required majority for election is a simple majority (changed from the current TOR requirement for a supermajority).

• If there are the same or fewer nominations than the number of co-chair positions, then a 2-week period will be allowed for any objections to be raised by the CPB membership to any of the candidates.

  • Objections should be made via e-mail to the acting CPB chair, who may be a previous chair who is not standing again.

  • If any objections are raised to a nominee, and these are not for issues that would prevent the nominee from standing, then a vote will be taken.

  • If an objection is raised that should exclude the nominee from standing, then the nomination will not be accepted.

  • If no objections are raised, then after 2 weeks, the nominees will be elected as co-chairs.