Dear all,

Thank you again for signing this petition.  We are at 284 now!  I feel confident that we have both the facts and the numbers on our side.

Some of you may have received the draft minutes of the May 14 meeting, oddly sent by a former Club president, a retired Manager of Lease and Space Management at the university.  It is clear that the board wishes for this to blow over.  But, as we know, there were fatal errors made at and about that meeting.  They say that the Club has permanently closed.  It hasn’t.

Even if the Club were to have to dissolve, this was not the correct and appropriate way to do it.  

Non-profit Corporations like the University Club operate under the Non-Profit Corporations Act.  A Special Meeting is a meeting called according to very specific rules laid out in the Act for calling special meetings.  The May 14 meeting was not called according to these rules.  The notice was 11 days, not the required minimum 15 days.  The notice made no mention of a motion to dissolve to be voted on; it just said that a recommendation was to be discussed.  Then, during the meeting, there was no careful accounting of who was attending.  I’ve been provided with numbers between about 60 and — more recently — about 70.  There was no proper vote.  Not a single person actually voted affirmatively to dissolve the Club.  In the days following the meeting, they’ve themselves questioned voting eligibility of some originally (implicitly or explicitly) counted as having voted.  

This was to be the most consequential meeting in the life of the University Club.  It should have been held according to rules, and according to the highest standards.  It wasn't. 

The meeting we are calling attempts to correct that mistake.

Since the vote, the board has failed to send me a members’ list, which they are obligated to do when requested, according to the Act.  Last Friday, they were sent a list of about 200 people who had signed this petition by then, asking to call a proper Special Meeting of Club members.  I asked them to verify that at least 5% of the Club membership (about 20 people) was included in the list.  They have failed to respond so far.

If the May 14 meeting was not called according to the rules, it was not a Special Meeting of University Club members; it did not have the authority to make any decisions, let alone the ultimate decision to permanently shut down the Club.  Not to mention the procedural errors made at the meeting itself.  

This cannot stand. 

The members among us have requisitioned a Special Meeting, as we are entitled to, and I look forward to it being called soon.

Thank you!

Nadeem Jamali