It should be firstly noted that she has omitted Reece McKenzie from the well wishes she has given to departing players.
In reading anything from the club you should always read between the lines about what they are not giving you details about. These things are always mentioned to have deniability later that these issues were communicated to members.
In September we welcomed former premiership player Emmett Dunne to the board. Emmett brings enormous experience with him in the areas of ethics, governance and risk management as a result of his decorated career with the Victoria Police. These skills are of critical importance to the Club and the implications of getting it wrong are enormous. We are delighted to have him join the Board.
An overview of our strategy can be found under the ‘Club’ menu item on our website. The same menu item contains the Club’s constitution, election by-laws as well as our Nominations Committee composition and charter.
http://www.richmondfc.com.au/news/2016-11-04/presidents-column-november-2016
I can only presume O'Neal is indulging in satire when she notes Dunne's experience in ethics and governance.
Matthies retired after more than ten years on the board in September and the first any member was aware was when Dunne was announced as having met the Nominations Committee and been APPOINTED to serve the remaining two months of the term before facing election in November. Ethical to have a vacancy occur and for it to be filled by the board without informing members?
The two sentences about the "club" menu item is where all the interesting things start to occur.
In the Election by-laws part it says that they are pursuant to clause 12 of the Constitution.
Clause 12 of the Constitution gives the board the "power from time to time to make, alter, amend and repeal any or all such by-laws as it may deem necessary"
The Election by-laws then make rules about campaign materials (2.1), timing of election materials (3.1), other election material (3.2), penalties for breaches (3.3).
Thus Simon Wallace's use of his website is illegal under these by-laws and he may be disqualified from election.
There is no date on these by-laws but there is a date (18 October 2016) on the new "charter" of the Nominations Committee.
It should be noted that the original press release about the Nominations Committee was removed from the club website after it became obvious, given Caro's reporting,
http://www.theage.com.au/afl/afl-news/afl-2016-richmond-rebels-cut-ties-with-developer-joe-russo-20160804-gqkvdf.html that the board was not following it's own rules regarding Chairmanship and members serving during their election years. Another version was then posted and now we have another dated 18 October 2016.
al has found and posted the link with the full description:
As I said before, it's important to look closely at things that the board only mentions in passing.
It's also important that forums like these are a record of what has happened in the past that authorities try to clean from their own records.
