Tim: For those of you getting multiple copies of this, my apologies but we
might as well let the whole crew know. State Coordinators may send this
along to their CCs if they wish. And someone may send this on to the
Census lists as I'm not subscribed there.
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Ginger:
From: VCisewski(a)aol.com
Date: Tue, 25 May 1999 19:45:19 EDT
Subject: Re: USGW-CC-L: Motion 99-12 - Census
To: USGW-CC-L(a)usgennet.org
I apologize in advance to the CC's on this list who have grown weary of this,
but Tim Stowell has chosen not to respond to me on the Board-L list and has
directed me here.
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Tim: First of all Virginia, I was answering your question here, as this is
where you asked it originally. I sent a reply to the list and when I
answered on the Board-L list was under the impression it had made it to
this list. I did not know until later that that note had bounced until so
informed by the list owner who then forwarded to this list.
There was in my mind no reason to answer the same note twice.
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Ginger: Tim,
>tstowell(a)chattanooga.net writes:
>
>> The Bylaws demand this - the Board has the duty to
>> enforce the Bylaws period.
>
>Could you please be so kind as to enlighten us in just which Article and
>Section of the Bylaws it states that the USGenWeb Census Project is
required
>to be housed in the directory of the USGenWeb Archives Project?
Once again NOT the Archives Project. The Census Project, the Archives
Project and the Tombstone Project are all co-equal parts of the Project
Archives.
Yes, they are co-equal parts of the Project Archives. That makes it improper
and unlawful to demand the Census Project move its files into the Archives
Project's directory.
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Tim: It is not my impression that it is the Archives Project's directory
but the Digital Library ie Project Archives spoken of in the Bylaws. The
structure set up some time back. If this is an incorrect statement would
someone please clarify this?
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Article 2 Section 2 - says in part 'The USGenWeb Project shall
also provide
a 'digital library' called the USGenWeb Project Archives.' Again the
Bylaws don't put every single item in black and white - one is supposed to
use one's head. Obviously Archives have to come from somewhere ie the SPs.
That's how they started out - there was no need for a change - only
someone decided they could do what they wanted and the rest of the Project
could go fly a kite.
Ginger: The fact remains that there is NOTHING in the Bylaws that requires
any of the
SPs to keep their files in a certain directory or on a certain server, any
more than State or County sites are so required.
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Tim: Bylaws aren't made to spell out everything - one must use one's head.
They are broad based guidelines that require fleshing out.
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Ginger said: The rest of this statement is a purely personal opinion and a
rather unkind jump to conclusions.
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Tim : While it might be a personal opinion, it is an opinion held by a
rather large group of other folks as well. I have observed this from
reading numerous list postings.
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>Motion 99-4 which the Board passed in February with a
substantial 11
votes,
>clearly recognized the right of a Special Project to have its
own
directory,
>and recognized the USGenWeb Census Project as a separate entity
from the
>USGenWeb Archives Project and the other officially recognized Special
>Projects.
While the Board made a statement by passing Motion 99-4 - It doesn't mean
they understood the way in which the Project Archives were set up and
apparently still don't.
Ginger: The Board made that statement through legal means and based on the
Bylaws.
As National Coordinator you are obligated to abide by that ruling. Your
personal opinions regarding it are perhaps a reason for your failure to
instruct the Webmaster to immediately display it on the Special Projects page
as the Motion demanded.
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Tim: Please remember that the Board decided in Motion 99-2 that the NC
needed a Secretary to help do the job - effectively stripping any duties
away from the NC - other than...? Since Board Secretary Bill was on the
job - there appeared no need for me to be involved with the web site
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The Census Project having it's own directory outside of the
Project
Archives which may/or may not be allowed, does prevent it from being
searched by the Project Archives search engine thus hurting researchers.
Ginger: True. But the fact remains, it is not illegal to do so.
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Tim: That is personal opinion, right? Has the Board said so? The Board
should not support copying other folks work whether that be from a
copyrighted book or from a file submitted to the Archives. Copying is
copying whether electronic or otherwise.
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The Board didn't have to recognize the Census Project as a
separate entity
from the Archives Project as that was already outlined in the Bylaws.
>It also strongly recommended that the USGenWeb Archives Project
>refrain from transcription of Census data and concentrate on the many
other
>types of data not currently being transcribed, an item that the
Archives
>Project has selectively chosen to ignore, and has apparently chosen to
>interpret to suit its own purposes.
>
>If the Archives Project had done as the Board "strongly recommended" the
>problem would have been solved there and then.
Actually the crux of the matter is why did a manager copy a project after
being refused a seperate directory by the Project Archives manager?
Ginger: And who would you elevate to that position? The Bylaws make no
provisions
for such a position. The managers of the Special Projects are spelled out,
but there is no provision in the Bylaws for a Project Archives Manager, thus
there is none.
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Tim: In my opinion the Project Archives/Digital Library shows by it's
design that careful and logical plans were implemented with future growth
in mind well before the first files were even submitted. This along with
continuity of management guidelines has allowed the Library to grow to it's
present size and still be manageable.
Having all the SPs under this umbrella in one directory structure makes it
easy for the researcher to find out all about Jacob Smith in x county
whether it be a birth, death, tombstone or census record of his presence.
Do the Bylaws mention how to deal with parts of the Project that existed
well before they did? Are the pre-Bylaws projects grand fathered in? How
do we accommodate folks doing these jobs? Do they just get tossed on their
heads?
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And why did said manager not want to follow the guidelines set up in
1996/97?
Ginger: The Census Project is not bound by the guidelines of the Archives
Project any
more than North Dakota pages are bound by the Iowa page guidelines.
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Tim: All of the States Projects and SP Projects are bound by the
guidelines of the Bylaws while internally they may have bylaws, rules,
whatever structure specific to their particular area of influence.
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Why did they do this on their own without Board approval and into a
directory not set up for such a purpose? The original purpose of said
directory was just for programmers to use in testing the CART program.
Ginger: The Census Coordinator has already answered that for you at length,
and I
will not presume to answer for her.
I suppose though that that is ok with some that some individuals can
do as
they wish while others can not.
Tim
Ginger: IMO, you seem to have no problem doing as you wish. You invited
someone to
be a Board member before the Board had even decided how to fill the vacancy,
even though the Bylaws give you no authority to do so.
Ginger Cisewski
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NOTE: the posts below are all from me in quotes " " all but the first
viewable on the Board-L archives. - Tim
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Tim:
I asked the Board - Friday, 21 May, 1999 10:17 "Does the Board entertain to
either hold a mini-election within Kim's old region - of the SCs within
that region or to just take the next highest vote getter from last summer -
to see if they are still interested?"
Over the next several hours I heard from 4 Board members saying that in
effect they thought that precedent had been to got the route of the next
highest vote getter, so I approached it that way. Other Board members
along this path of thought that the Board should do nothing until the
position had been filled.
About the same time Motion 99-12 - Census hit the floor was seconded,
opened for discussion, whereupon it was requested to be tabled until we had
a full Board. I in the meantime had written to Mr David Young the person
with the next highest number of votes in that region last summer, and
awaited his reply.
His reply came some time Saturday afternoon, in the affirmative. I had
sent along my note to David to the Board and then later his reply. I then
asked for a Motion to confirm his appointment and it was suggested that
while it might be appropriate to make the motion acting on it might not be.
The Board then wanted to give Mr Young reading and I suppose writing
privileges to the Board lists but not membership?
My question to that was - 'How can action on a motion to accept a new Board
member be out of order? Asking David Young to become Kim's replacement as
the next highest vote receiver has been the policy of the Board since
replacements began last fall. Why the apparent change?
First of all, some members wanted to table motion 99-12 until we had a full
Board and that is fine, I don't have a problem with doing so. Now that the
Board has the opportunity to fill this slot - what is the holdup?'
The Board is now voting on this motion - stopping in mid vote for some
discussion - hopefully will finish voting soon.
In conclusion - The Project must come together in some compromise solution.
If the Archives file managers and the Census file managers would work
together with Census file managers only handling Census records and
Archives file managers handling Archive files only for x county - would
that be a workable compromise for both parties so that the files could all
be within the same directory structure and thereby return information on a
one stop shop by a researcher?
In an informal poll going on on the Archives list, I've seen this spirit of
cooperation in answer to the question - 'whether you would be willing to
work with census coordinators'. In light of this, what say you census
coordinators?
Remember the researcher is why we are all here. For that and for no other
reason.
Tim Stowell, NC