Dear Member,
The upcoming September SGM is an important one and we are asking you to show your support for a board which has worked hard to restore safe spaces for volunteers of DTE.
By voting No for motions 1, 5 and 6 you are reaffirming the decisions this board has made in its efforts to build a safer space for you.
While some in our community may like to argue differently, the fiduciary duties of directors don’t allow us to just act on others' instructions, even if those others are members or committees.
One of our rules which highlights the independence of the board is rule 38 (3)
(3) The Board must maintain a non-executive, 'wise elder' role and ensure that the Co-operative fulfils its legal and ethical obligations.
We believe we have been both wise elders in seeking mutual solutions and then finally acting to fulfil our legal and ethical obligations when those efforts failed.
We had members who claimed they were not getting their notices and it was impossible to confirm as the administrators of dte.org.au refused to co-operate. They were asked politely, then instructed; still access was denied. In attempting to sort this out we found we had no way of validating these claims nor fixing the situation. Not once was the co-op advised of a bounced email address in the entire time notices have been sent out from dte.org.au
The server administrators were unable to provide access and, when pressed by the board, were obstructionist and did not cooperate or comply with requests.
One of our own domains had become a rule unto itself.
Is this why you shut down data.dte.org.au?
Yes
It is a privately funded and administered space and does not declare this to its visitors
The maladministration
The toxic mailing lists
The defamatory material
Inappropriately obtained and used members list
Risk of third party malware upload/download
Specifically this time
The board's inability to validate data on the server, compromising members' notices, compromising the cooperative's good governance.
What did the board do?
It reasserted control of the domain dte.org.au
It shut down the toxic mailing lists
Introduced moderated mailing lists
Deduplicated email accounts
Made it possible to validate member notices mailouts
Improved the integrity of the process for submission of motions
Also under the stewardship of this current board we have sailed ourselves into calmer waters. You can see from the minutes consistent stewardship of Robin Macpherson as Chair and Kathy Ernst as Secretary. This board has collaborated better and been far more effective in getting things done. As a result our response is getting quicker and the number of complaints is way down.
We are at the core becoming a calmer, more considerate community while also well aware of those amongst us who would prefer to sow the seeds of discontent to take us back to the days of yesterday's toxicity, however this board believes we can do better.
It is with this in mind the board continues in this direction and while it might not suit some, our duty is to put the co-operative first.
A Board Update
Yes, the board still has its disagreements; however they are not like the disagreements of old. It is a more informed board and our approach is to look to effect change in the wording of a motion to gain a greater agreement amongst us.
Some of us put aside a couple of hours a week to discuss board business in a more casual way, to work out motions to consider multiple points of view, and deal with confidential matters not possible in the public meetings. We can assure you we would rather be spending those hours doing something non-DTE, however the workload is much larger than many think, mainly because of the systemic dysfunction this board has inherited and is doing its best to rectify.
We believe it is unfair to burden an incoming board with the undone tasks of past boards. It can build to such an amount an incoming board can be immediately overwhelmed with undone things from past boards. We are doing our best to clear the decks, improve the systems so the next board can focus on current and future needs of the co-operative.
We hope you appreciate us reaching out to you and informing you of the reasoning behind our actions, along with a bit of an update on where we are at. We feel that writing to you allows for you to better consider our words rather than the spoken in the moment of the meeting itself.
Your Support is important. We ask for you to reaffirm our decisions by attending the SGM on Monday 11th September at 7:30pm and Vote No to Motions 1, 5 and 6
September SGM Notice
Meeting Monday 11th September - 7:30PM - Zoom Room Link Regards
The Board
Down to Earth Co-operative (Victoria)