Regional Message Board Council Act

Codex Memorial Garden The Magisterium
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With the judicial status of Civil Trials still unclear, we in the RMBC Working Group have decided to put forth this act without those provisions, until such a time as the legal issues can be resolved. Therefore, here is the RMB Council Act in its present form. I am open to comments and amendments!

SECTION I. ESTABLISHMENT

…1.1. This act shall be known and cited as the Regional Message Board Council Act, or RMBCA.

…1.2. The Regional Message Board Council, hereinafter RMBC, is established as the representative body of the Regional Message Board community and the bridge between the government and RMB.

…1.3. The RMBC shall consist of three members elected according to the provisions of this act.

…1.4. The RMBC shall be entitled to both a private and public channel in The East Pacific discord or the RMB Cafeteria discord to serve as their base of operations, in lieu of the forums.

SECTION II. COUNCIL ELECTIONS

…2.1. The RMB Council shall be elected to terms equal to that of the Delegate, in elections held in concert with the Delegate elections.
……2.1.1. The RMBC shall be elected by method of Single Transferrable Vote.

…2.2. Elections shall last one week, upon the conclusion of a standing period also lasting one week.

…2.3. Elections shall be administered by an appointee of the Viceroy holding RMB status.
……2.3.1. Should any Arbiter(s) hold RMB status, that Arbiter or those Arbiters shall be preferred for the role.

…2.4. Anyone holding RMB Status may run for election and vote in the election.
……2.4.1. During the standing period, any eligible nation may nominate another or stand for election themselves.

…2.5. All candidates shall be entitled to a campaign dispatch, all of which shall be compiled into an election information dispatch which all voters shall have access to.
……2.5.1. Candidates may distribute their dispatch in the RMB or any official discord servers.
……2.5.2. Violations of the campaigning provisions shall result in disqualification.

…2.6. Any five residents of RMB status may sign a petition to challenge a member of the RMBC. Immediately upon the receipt of a duly signed petition, an election shall be held for the challenged seat.
……2.6.1. The challenged member shall be automatically enrolled as a candidate.
……2.6.2. Should one member be challenged, the election shall be conducted by method of Instant Run-Off Voting. Should more than one member be challenged, the elections shall be combined and conducted by method of Single Transferrable Vote.

SECTION III. RMB STATUS

…3.1. RMB Status shall be a requirement for serving on the Council or voting for Council members.

…3.2. RMB Status shall not confer additional benefits or any disadvantages, nor shall it be exclusive with citizenship.

…3.3. All members of a map which is based on the RMB and recognized by the RMBC who hold residency in The East Pacific shall have RMB Status.
……3.3.1. Any map which is based on the RMB and recognized by a Resolution of the Magisterium shall be recognized by the RMBC.
…….3.3.2. Other maps which are based on the RMB may be recognized by a vote of the RMBC.
…3.3.3 A map recognized by a vote of the RMBC may have its RMBC recognition withdrawn by a vote of the RMBC according to a set of criteria established and made publicly available by the RMBC.
……3.3.4. The RMBC shall create a public dispatch with a list of all recognized maps.
…3.3.5. The standards used to grant or withdraw recognition of a map may be altered by a vote of the RMBC, accompanied by a public announcement of the change to the Regional Message Board.
……3.3.6. Should the recognition of a map be withdrawn, all members of the map shall have their RMB Status preserved independently and, if not present on another recognized map, shall be added to the public waivers list.
…3.3.7. Maps that have wrongfully had recognition declined or withdrawn may appeal to the Conclave.

…3.4. Any resident without map membership may apply for RMB Status based on a set of criteria established and made publicly available by the RMBC.
……3.4.1. Wrongfully denied applicants may appeal to Conclave.
……3.4.2. The RMBC shall maintain a list of all waivers granted.
……3.4.3. A waiver granting RMB status may be revoked by the RMBC according to a set of criteria established and made publicly available by the RMBC.
…3.4.4. A person whose RMB status waiver is revoked will be notified by telegram sent from the RMB Council.
…3.4.5. The standards used to grant or revoke a waiver may be altered by a vote of the RMBC, accompanied by a public announcement of the change to the Regional Message Board.

…3.5. RMB Status shall be relinquished upon CTE or loss of residency status.

SECTION IV. DUTIES AND POWERS

…4.1. The RMBC shall be tasked with representing the interests of the RMB community to the Magisterium.
……4.1.1. To accomplish this task, members of the RMBC are encouraged to join the Magisterium upon election.
……4.1.2. Nothing in this act shall be construed to bar anyone of RMB status from becoming a Magister or speaking/voting contrary to any member of the Council on any issue, or to bar any members of the Council from speaking/voting contrary to each other on any issue.
……4.1.3. The RMBC shall work to increase and/or maintain RMB representation in the Magisterium by advertising positions as it deems fit.
……4.1.4. The Provost shall hold a non-voting seat on the RMBC to advise on political and legal ideas and realities.

…4.2. The RMBC shall be tasked with representing the interests of the RMB community to the Executive.
……4.2.1. To accomplish this task, at least one member of the RMBC must be inducted into the Cabinet as an Advisor.
……4.2.2. The RMBC shall work with the Executive to host games, polls, and other events to include the RMB community.
…….4.2.3. The RMBC shall work to increase RMB representation in the Executive by advertising positions as it deems fit.
……4.2.4. The Delegate shall hold a non-voting seat on the RMBC to advise on political and legal ideas and realities.

…4.3. The RMBC shall be tasked with representing the interests of the RMB community to the Conclave and the Praesidium.
……4.3.1. The RMBC shall conduct all due diligence to ensure that the rights of non-citizens are known and respected during all legal proceedings and all security decisions.
……4.3.2. The Viceroy and Grand Vizier shall hold non-voting seats on the RMBC to advise on political and legal ideas and realities.

…4.4. The RMBC shall conduct surveys and polls to gather data on RMB community health, political opinions, and the general state of government-RMB integration.
……4.4.1. This shall include a review of RMB representation in the various government branches.
…….4.4.2. The RMBC shall make a public report of the data they collect at least once every election cycle, to be delivered at least one week before the opening of the nomination process.
…….4.4.3. The RMBC shall, if applicable, propose policies which respond to the needs of the RMB community.

…4.5. The RMBC shall take initiative to welcome new nations to the RMB and recruit to recognized maps.

…4.6. The RMBC shall maintain a shared nation between all current voting members and at least one Admin, to host dispatches for displaying information required to be made public by this Act, and any others they so choose.
……4.6.1. The RMBC shall create and maintain back-ups of key dispatches as it deems fit.

…4.7. In the event that a crisis arises, a petition of five residents of RMB Status or a vote of the RMBC shall temporarily expand the Council to seven members.
……4.7.1. The additional four members shall be directly appointed by the RMBC.
……4.7.2. The new members shall assist in crisis management, as it comes to drafting policy and engaging with members of the community and the government.
……4.7.3. The RMBC may vote at any time to end the crisis expansion.

…4.8. All votes of the RMBC shall be made public on Discord and a dispatch record.

…4.9. The RMBC shall work closely with the cartographers/administrators of each recognized map in the pursuit of their duties; each recognized map’s governing body shall be entitled to send one (1) non-voting representative to the RMBC.

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Can you explain what you mean with this bit?

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The ruling given on the recent civil trials subject didn’t make sense to me. Not in the sense of legally unsound but in the sense of me just not being able to actually understand it. And I didn’t feel like it gave a definitive answer on the parts of the RMBC proposal that I wanted to test legality on. I’ve been meaning to follow it up but I’ve been far too busy.

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Before I begin, I’d like to thank the RMB working group for continuing to put in the effort to bring these reforms into reality. I am hopeful that these changes will bring greater harmony to relations between the RMB and the Government, as well as to The East Pacific’s community as a whole. As a councilor, I look forward to being able to serve and represent the RMB in these matters.

With that being said, it is my first time providing feedback in a formal capacity as either a Councilor or Magister. Feedback on my feedback is appreciated.

The ethics of voting for oneself in council elections has been discussed elsewhere. It may be worth explicitly clarifying that fact here, especially if we want to ban it.

There may be issues with the number of signatories required for petitions due to the drop in activity on the rmb, both rp and otherwise. For instance, in the recent election there were roughly 9 votes, compared to the original count of about 25. While I think the challenge petition signatory number would still function, it would be a much larger percentage of the ‘politically active’ public than existed when this proposal was first being workshopped. Was there an intent behind picking these numbers in particular being selected?

Without knowing those particular thoughts, I would move to change these numbers to 3 for a challenge petition and 7 for a crisis petition. I think ideally we’d be using a percentage of some kind to be able to peg these numbers to the amount of activity/membership in the rmb, but I don’t believe we have reliable information for that as of right now, given both the unstable conditions of the recent RMBC election and the lack of elections from which to compare voter rolls to voter participation.

This is a suggested change to reflect the language used for granting of RMB status waivers, to make sure that there are clear guidelines for this.

Related to the need for guidelines, given that the point below this references withdrawing of recognition, I think it would be good to add in at least one additional point defining how to withdraw recognition from a map:

…….3.3.3. A map recognized by a vote of the RMBC may have its RMBC recognition withdrawn by a vote of the RMBC according to a set of criteria established and made publicly available by the RMBC.

For easy copy-paste and to mirror the above I wrote out a possible 3.3.4, but I believe it might be redundant given the nature of a repeal in the first place.

…….3.3.4. A map recognized by a Resolution of the Magisterium will have its RMBC recognition withdrawn if the Resolution granting it recognition is Repealed.

From here, I think it would be good to have language for both the changing of these standards:

…….3.3.5. The standards used to grant or withdraw recognition of a map may be altered by a vote of the RMBC, accompanied by a public announcement of the change to the Regional Message Board.

And recourse for a map that has its recognition withdrawn

…….3.3.6. Maps that have wrongfully had recognition declined or withdrawn may appeal to the Conclave..

Under the current wording, I think those with RMB waivers are granted a ‘preferred’ status over people on maps, as the latter are subject to activity checks. From my current understanding, this has the secondary effect of rewarding membership in an inactive map, as it provides an easy pathway to receiving unrevokable RMB status. My hope would be two changes:

Firstly, separate RMB waivers from map activity, such that it is mutually exclusive, in order to more accurately determine voter rolls and determine where RMB activity is coming from.

……3.3.4. Should the recognition of a map be withdrawn, all members of the map shall have their RMB Status preserved independently, and not present on another recognized map shall be added to the public waivers list.

Secondly, allow for the RMBC to remove RMB status waivers in order to preserve activity requirements, using language mirroring the granting of the waivers:

……3.4.3. A waiver granting RMB status may be revoked by the RMBC according to a set of criteria established and made publicly available by the RMBC

Require notification to the impacted person:

……3.4.4. A person whose RMB status waiver is revoked will be notified by telegram sent from the RMB Council Account

Next, language to have a more formal process for altering these standards:

……3.4.5. The standards used to grant or revoke a waiver may be altered by a vote of the RMBC, accompanied by a public announcement of the change to the Regional Message Board.

And finally, remove the ‘only’ from the last point to have it serve as a catch-all for uncovered cases:

……3.4.6. RMB Status shall only be relinquished upon CTE or loss of residency status.

I disagree with this portion. While engagement with the Magisterium is necessary to properly carry out the job, requiring membership in a secondary legislative body is, in my opinion, at best superfluous, and at worst discourages otherwise capable RMB members from running to serve within the RMB council. My larger concern is that there are edge cases in which the Magisterium is effectively granted the ability to deny or remove a member of the Council over the votes of the RMB itself. To the extent that Magister status is required for technical or legal reasons, it is my opinion that the Magisterium should work to encode these permissions within the role of RMB Councilor itself.

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I personally don’t think it should be banned and that if it’s not banned explicitly, it’s allowed. If we want to ban it, we can, but I’m very meh about it. I tried to ban voting for oneself in Arbiter and Vizier nominations but it got a lot of pushback when I did, and Provost/Delegate/GV/EPPSC/Viceroy elections have no such ban either.

It was mostly vibes based, and partially based in recall petitions I’ve seen in other regions and in student government. I see your point though.

I don’t like odd numbers. That’s a bad reason not to do something, so I will do it, but I wanted to first suggest: What do you think about just five for both? If you don’t like it, 3 and 7 it is.

I like this.

Can do.

Yeah redundant

Makes sense

Sure

I’m happy with this

That makes sense. I’ll make it encouraged rather than required

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I don’t feel strongly about either number in particular; they were mostly picked to lower the thresholds at least a small amount, though the crisis number I think requires a decrease due to being higher than voter turnout. The challenge number only being three does give me some concern about being too low given a more healthy amount of activity, so I’d be happy to go with 5 and 5.

[L-2026-16] The Regional Message Board Council Act
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Sure, let me know if/when you’d like to address it.

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I’ve finally updated this with Daravon’s comments. Since those were already public and I already said which of them I would incorporate, I don’t see this as having fundamentally changed. For these reasons, I motion for a vote.

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second

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Before we move to vote, I think this section should be proactively updated to account for the changes to the delegacy and head of government being proposed in the HOGS amendment. As a possible formatting, in which we’d keep the four month term:

…2.1. The RMB Council shall be elected every four months equal to that of the Delegate, in elections held in concert with the Delegate elections.