Aug 29, 2019 – Day 2 – Daily Minutes – S & B Committee Opening Report

OPENING REPORT

C.A. WORLD SERVICE CONFERENCE 2019

STRUCTURE AND BYLAWS COMMITTEE REPORT

INTRODUCTION AND OPENING COMMENTS:

This year it is in the Chairman of this committees opinion that the committee did a tremendous job and had great participation as a committee as a whole. The corrected version of the World service Manual was completed and submitted to our Trustee for review on October 21of 2018. This was faster than last year which was also done a few months earlier. This is all due to the fact that the

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Conference Committee does such a tremendous job of getting out the Conference materials including the Summary of motions in such an efficient and timely manner. The Committee has worked on several referrals during the year and made good progress on the ones not yet submitted for consideration.

COMMITTEE INTRODUCTIONS:

Clayton P	Chair
Taylor F	Vice Chair
Zach A	Secretary
Katie B	Secretary
Kevin M	WSOT
Kerry W	SWRT
Randy M	WSOB
Casey S
Maxine McI
Rodney D
Tom W
Ernest M
Nathan B
Lucas S
Joetta K
Billy L
Ray M
Michael C
Deloris B

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Duane M

Keith M

SUMMARY OF COMMITTEE MATTERS WORKED ON

THROUGHOUT THE YEAR

The Committee had a conference call every month since last year’s Conference and this years, and there have been a lot of calls between the different subcommittees established to work on the referrals the Committee has worked on throughout the year. The committee would also like to thank the past Char Rodney for his efforts in finishing up a couple of items from his tenure that have been kept in committee the past few years.

SUMMARY OF SR14 MATERIALS SUBMITTED IN 2019 AND WHAT TO EXPECT DURING THE COMMITTEE MOTIONS LATER THIS WEEK

The Committee submitted six items for SR14 material and they are as follows:

1. A motion to change the number of delegates areas receive per the number of meetings in the area. We received two referrals regarding this in 2017 and have been working on it since then and feel the proposal we came up with best allocates delegates to areas without to drastically changing the current status quo.
2. The organogram on page 12 of the WSM has been modified to include the Online groups that exist in the Cocaine Anonymous fellowship, and to include the CAWSO Board of Directorships included later in the manual on page 61.

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3. An amending of the WSM to include Delegate responsibilities regarding SR14 materials being shared with their areas for feedback so as to pass on information about the WSO and WSC with enthusiasm to encourage the continued growth and health of the fellowship.
4. An additional sentence to be added to SR13 to have material submitted for SR14 priority must be voted on by a conference committee unless previously submitted to a conference committee under SR13.
5. Changing the length of service for the Group PI Liaison from 6 months to 1 year.
6. To add material to the fellowship regarding the recording of speakers at CA events. It is the purpose of this referral to enhance the protection of speaker’s anonymity, to, protect CA against legal issues that may result surrounding ownership of material and permission for distribution, and to implement an unavoidable introductory statement which gives substantial clarification the speakers are not representing CA.

REFERRALS THAT WERE FORWARDED TO OTHER

COMMITTEES DURING THE YEAR:

S&B 2017-15​from WSBT (In-Conference)

Article 10 of the Conference Charter includes: “But no change in Article 10 of the Charter or in the Twelve Traditions of C.A., or in the Twelve Steps of C.A. may be made with less than the written consent of three-quarters of the C.A. Groups.” Since the process for contacting and obtaining responses from the C.A. Groups is not defined, please provide a process for meeting this requirement.

S&B 2018-13 from Cynthia C. Washington State Area (In-Conference)

With regard to Referral S&B 2017-15 please consider the following:

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1. Does the existing language in the Charter set a threshold of 3/4 of the C.A. Groups known to exist, or only those Groups responding? Other thresholds in the WSM are explicit, as in further down in section 4 (“a three-quarters vote of all the voting Conference members registered and present”) and the TEC process (“Abstentions will not be considered a vote, and the election will be affirmed by two-thirds of the voting members”). For a decision of this magnitude, I believe the language should be construed literally to mean three-quarters of *the* C.A. groups, not just those voting.
2. If you agree that the threshold should be 3/4 of all C.A. Groups, how is that total number to be determined? Will the count be based on meeting directories, Regional Trustee reports, or some other method? As of what date will the number of groups be determined–the close of the Conference where the motion is approved, the date the ballots are mailed, the deadline for them to be returned, or somewhere in between? The size of some Areas may be changing by one or more Groups each month, which is the rate of growth we’re experiencing here in Washington State.
3. Is it appropriate to place the burden for distributing and returning ballots on the Delegates and/or the Districts? Can exceptions be made for Groups that are unable to attend their Area meeting due to geographic or other challenges (for example, the Spokane Group in Washington State), so that they can obtain the ballot online, print it out and mail it directly to the WSO? Can ballots be returned electronically to save postage, particularly from Areas outside the U.S.?

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4. Would it be appropriate to have the Office mail a brief notice of the pending vote (perhaps a postcard, to reduce cost, or even an e-mail) to each Group registered with the WSO to help make sure the fellowship is adequately informed?
5. Will the ballots be verified by the World Service Office, either in their entirety or as random spot-checks? This could also be done by the Regional Trustees.

COMMITTEE STRUCTURE AS OF THE START OF THIS

CONFERENCE

Chair | Clayton P | clayboy7447@aol.com | 2163224316

Vice-Chair | Taylor F. | taylorthedad@gmail.com | 2064348937

Secretary | Zach A. | zachalby93@gmail.com  | 5128500132