OASIS Bylaws Changes

["Carol Geyer" <carol.geyer@oasis-open.org>]

OASIS Members:

The Board of Directors has approved revisions to the OASIS Bylaws, which
include extending the number of seats on the Board.  Our current Bylaws
provide that any change to the size of the Board requires a membership
vote. Each designated Voting Representative of an OASIS member
organization has been asked to vote on these revisions.  The voting
period opened
at 9:00pm PDT [GMT-7] 10 September and will extend until 9:00pm PDT
[GMT-7] 25 September 2003.

Proposed changes, which are documented in the OASIS Bylaws Draft
Revision - September 2003, found at
http://www.oasis-open.org/who/oasis_bylaws_draft.pdf, include:

Recommended Change #1. Increase the maximum number of Directors from 8
to 11.

Rationale for Change #1:
As OASIS has grown to over 300 organizational members (from technology,
government and many end-user industry sectors), increasing the size of
the Board will allow for broader representation.

Recommended Change #2. Designate the OASIS President position an
"Appointed Director," and all other Director positions "Elected
Directors."

Rationale for Change #2.
This change will mean that the person who is hired by the Board of
Directors to serve as the full-time President & CEO of OASIS will not
have to stand for Board election by members.

Please contact your OASIS member representative to provide them with
your views on the Bylaws revisions during the ballot period.

Should the Bylaws Revisions be approved by the membership, the Board of
Directors will need to determine how to fill the three new Board
positions, two with terms expiring in July 2004 and one with a term
expiring in July 2005.

If you would like to provide feedback to the Board on this issue, please
ask your organization's OASIS Voting Representative to email
oasisboard@lists.oasis-open.org <mailto:oasisboard@lists.oasis-open.org>
before 17 September indicating your preference for the Board to take one
of these actions:

 a) Current Board directors use their best judgment to fill the new
positions,
 b) OASIS initiates a special nomination and election process, or
 c) Other suggestions.

Thank you for your continued support of the growing activities at OASIS.

---------------------------------------------------------------------
Patrick Gannon
President & CEO
OASIS
630 Boston Road
Billerica, MA 01821 USA
+1.978.667.5115 x201 (Office)
+1.978.761.3546  (Mobile)
http://www.oasis-open.org