The Council On Legislation (COL) is held once every three years with the 2019 cycle recently concluded in Chicago, Illinois from April 14 through April 18, 2019. 116 proposed enactments plus one RI board proposed position statement were presented, 47 were adopted, 55 were rejected and 15 were withdrawn. Of the 47 pieces of adopted legislation 6 items were of direct consequence to clubs.
19-22 | If a club is unable to find a president-elect, it may ask the current president to serve a second consecutive year. However, no president may serve three or more consecutive years. |
19-24 | Club officers must provide the membership with a mid-year financial status report and a financial report of the previous year by 31 December. |
19-35 | Currently, makeups (for clubs which still require makeups) must be made within 14 days before or after the missed meeting. The new enactment allows makeups to be done anytime during the same Rotary year, which may put a recordkeeping burden on the club secretary. |
19-54 | A club cannot participate in district voting on any matter if it is delinquent on paying its district dues. |
19-70 | The RI board may terminate a club upon the request of the district governor if the club membership falls below six members. |
19-82 | Per capita RI dues will increase by $1 US for each half-year starting 1 July 2019 through 30 June 2022. Total annual dues in US dollars are $68 in 2019-20, $70 in 2020-21 and $72 in 2021-22 |
The complete list of proposals (in 2 parts) are available in the files section along with final voting totals.
The final item to be considered, 19-117, is a special case since it does not affect any RI constitutional document but its approval was needed by the COL for the board to proceed. Accordingly, it is discussed at length in a separate addition to this report (Item 19-117 Analysis) and a FAQ provided by the RI board to COL reps (Item 19-117 FAQ). Briefly, the council approved the board’s authority to continue to change its US tax status with the IRS from 501(c)4 to 501(c)3. While this may seem trivial to many, especially to Rotarians outside of the US, it has some profound implications on the operations of both Rotary International and The Rotary Foundation. All Rotary clubs, regardless of location, may either be benefited or harmed by this decision. This decision has impact on TRF Canada and its relationship with RI as well as with TRF USA. As one of the few international districts in the world, we Rotarians in 6330 have considerable reason to closely follow this development.
The final download file, Rotary Fact Sheet, was provided to each representative at the opening of the council. Please take a look, it puts a lot of Rotary administrative decisions into prospective.
All enactments are effective 1 July, 2019.