Revised
REPORT OF BOARD OF TRUSTEES
BOT Report 14-A-07
Subject: Continuance, Discharge, and Establishment of Standing Committees
Presented by: C. Bruce Malone, MD, Chair
Referred to: Reference Committee on Financial and Organizational Affairs
TMA Bylaws provide that standing committees of the association shall be discharged at the expiration of three years unless the parent council or board petitions the Board of Trustees. The House of Delegates then acts on the recommendations of the board.
In July 2005, the Board of Trustees discussed the roles of TMA boards, councils, and committees and ways to evaluate them and ensure they are aligned with TMA's strategic goals and objectives. In September 2005, the board revised the committee sunset process with the adoption of new governance evaluation criteria. These include effectiveness-related criteria to ensure that each component's purpose and activities are aligned with TMA priorities, that meetings are productive and results-oriented, and that the workload is balanced among boards, councils, and committees. There also are involvement-related criteria to ensure that meetings are well attended and include the participation of special appointees, that the role of council and committee members as ambassadors for TMA to the broader membership is promoted, and that there is a broad diversity of leadership and constant recruitment of new leaders and new ideas.
Boards and councils were asked to employ the governance evaluation criteria to evaluate the standing committees reporting to them, and in February 2007 the board reviewed the reports. The board recommends that all but one of the standing committees be continued for one year and has requested that, during the year, the chair of the board or council to which each committee reports review with the committee its charge, relevance, and efficiency in accomplishing its goals. Recommendations for discharge of one standing committee and establishment of another are shown separately.
Recommendation 1: Continue 14 standing committees, as listed below, for a period of one year:
Reporting to Board of Trustees: Interspecialty Society Committee, Committee on Membership; reporting to Board of Councilors: Committee on Physician Health and Rehabilitation; reporting to Council on Legislation: Committee on Professional Liability; reporting to Council on Medical Education: Committee on Continuing Education, Committee on Physician Distribution and Health Care Access; reporting to Council on Public Health: Committee on Child and Adolescent Health, Committee on Emergency Medical Services and Trauma, Committee on Infectious Diseases, Committee on Maternal and Perinatal Health; reporting to Council on Scientific Affairs: Committee on Blood and Tissue Usage, Committee on Cancer; and reporting to Council on Socioeconomics: Patient-Physician Advocacy Committee, Committee on Rural Health.
Committee on State Appointments
The Committee on State Appointments is a standing committee that reports to the Board of Trustees. The TMA president serves as chair and the members are the immediate past president, president-elect, and chairs of the Council on Legislation and TEXPAC. The committee's purpose is stated in TMA Bylaws:
It shall be the objective of this committee to ensure that the medical profession is well-represented on appropriate state boards, agencies, and commissions, and on the Boards of Regents of educational institutions. The committee shall monitor available positions, solicit nominations from association boards, councils, and committees, and from county medical societies and individual members. Nominations will be presented to the Board of Trustees for approval, then transmitted to the Texas governor or to other appointing officials.
While the purposes of the Committee on State Appointments are clearly stated, its activities are dependent upon the environment in which it operates. At times there may be many opportunities for new appointments to state boards, agencies, commissions, and educational institutions - for example in election cycles when there are changes in the leadership of the state government. At other times there may be very little opportunity for appointments - for example when positions are filled and there is little turnover.
TMA Bylaws provide that, "Should any standing committee meet less than twice during the entire year between the end of one annual session and the end of the following annual session of the association, the committee shall be abolished." While the members of the Committee on State Appointments may hold several meetings when there are many opportunities available, there also may be periods when the committee does not hold two formal meetings in one year. For example, in 2006 committee members met with the governor's director of governmental appointments, but there were not two called meetings of the committee as would have been necessary to meet the bylaws requirement.
Because the committee addresses specific situations on an almost ad hoc basis, the board recommends that it be discharged as a standing committee of the association as defined in the bylaws. The board then will establish the Committee on State Appointments as a board committee with the same composition and purposes:
Structure : The Committee on State Appointments shall be a committee of the Board of Trustees.
Composition : The TMA president shall serve as chair and shall call meetings of the committee. Members shall include the immediate past president, president-elect, and chairs of the Council on Legislation and TEXPAC.
Reporting responsibilities : The Committee on State Appointments shall report to the Board of Trustees.
Purposes and activities : It shall be the objective of this committee to ensure that the medical profession is well-represented on appropriate state boards, agencies, and commissions, and on the Boards of Regents of educational institutions. The committee shall monitor available positions, solicit nominations from association boards, councils, and committees, and from county medical societies and individual members. Nominations will be presented to the Board of Trustees for approval and transmitted to the Texas governor or to other appointing officials.
Meetings : The Committee on State Appointments shall meet as necessary to carry out its responsibilities.
There is precedent for such a change. In November 1999, the House of Delegates approved discharging the Joint Committee on Physicians Benevolent Fund of TMA and TMAA, a standing committee of the association reporting to the Board of Trustees, and approved establishment of a board Committee on Physicians Benevolent Fund.
Recommendation 2: Discharge the Committee on State Appointments.
Recommendation 3: Amend TMA Bylaws Chapter 11, Committees, Section 11.60, Standing committees of boards, Section 11.61, Board of Trustees, by deleting Section 11.613, Committee on State Appointments.
TMA House of Delegates: TexMed 2007