Honestly, this woman had months to contact you or someone else to let you know what was going on and that she would be back. The fact that she couldn't find 1 minute in all that time to place a simple phone call would indicate to me that she did not take her position very seriously. I would look at the bylaws to see what if anything they say and I would have no issue with "N" retaining the seat. I do not think you acted too quickly. As the president you did what you thought was best for your organization considering you had a missing board member
Check your bylaws. Ours state that any member not able to perform their duties must inform the President to discuss what action must be taken to fulfill those requirements. If I had been in your shoes and unable to contact her and her child had not been enrolled in our school by the start of the year, I would have taken it to the board to fulfill the position with the runner up-which you did-or to take another vote. Knowing my board, we would have begged the runner up to take the position. If you do not have a protocol for this, I would call a special board meeting to discuss the issue. If no one can figure out what to do, you might want to consider a co-VP situation.
The irony of commitment is that it’s deeply liberating-in work, in play, in love. The act frees you from the tyranny of your internal critic, from the fear that likes to dress itself up and parade around as rational hesitation. To commit is to remove your head as the barrier to your life. --Anne Morris
Here is what is going on. I am the president of our PTO. Last year we had elections and one lady won, we will call her "T". Well the girl who ran against her was very upset to say the least. "T" went to another state over the summer with family. School started and still no T. I had no way to contact her to see if she still wanted to keep her vice president position. After 2 weeks I think it was, we decided to appoint "N" as vice president. We didn't do anything formal for this, nor did we open the position to anyone else in the school. (I think we acted too quickly) Well, T is back from the other state. She just talked to me and would like to keep her position. She had to stay in the other state because an illness of her grandma. Now, if that was the reason she was gone, would it have been wrong to "give" her position away. I am so confused about what I should do. If i could have talked to her before, I would have just said she was on leave or something. Any suggestions???
