Newsletter 25-13

Issue 25-13, June 25, 2025

+————————————CONTENTS—————————————-+

  1. DPS ELECTIONS AND PROPOSED AMENDMENT TO THE DPS BYLAWS
  2. DPS ELECTIONS CANDIDATE SLATE 
  3. PROPOSED AMENDMENTS TO THE DPS BYLAWS

+——————————————————————————————–+

1———1———1———1———1———1———1———1———1——-

DPS ELECTIONS AND PROPOSED AMENDMENT TO THE DPS BYLAWS 

Dear DPS Members,

We require your attention in a very important process concerning our community. The DPS Committee is asking you to vote and express your preference on two critical items of our activities: the new Committee members and the proposed changes in our bylaws that will allow us to operate more effectively.

All active DPS members recently received a ballot for a double vote: The ballot concerns both the 2025 DPS elections and necessary amendments in the DPS bylaws. This e-mail was sent to the address you used when registering with AAS/DPS.  If you do not see a ballot link in your mailbox, please check your spam/junk folder and also check that your DPS membership has not lapsed.  DPS Membership – AAS Division for Planetary Sciences

Please see hereafter the details for both requests of expression of opinion by the DPS membership. The deadline for the voting process is July 22, 2025.

2———2———2———2———2———2———2———2———2——-

DPS ELECTIONS CANDIDATE SLATE

.

LEADERSHIP: This year we are choosing a new Vice-Chair and two DPS Committee Members.  The Vice-Chair will become Chair in September 2026.  For more information about current officers and committee members, please visit the leadership section of the DPS website.  

CANDIDATES: Information and position statements for the candidates have been collected into this single PDF; however, if you prefer the information separately, please click on each candidate’s name in this section.  The same information is also accessible on your ballot.

Vice-Chair (Vote for 1)

DPS Committee Members (Vote for 2)

NEED HELP? Please contact Diane Frendak at [email protected] or 202-328-2010 x109.

3———3———3———3———3———3———3———3———3——-

PROPOSED AMENDMENTS TO THE DPS BYLAWS

As the DPS Committee has expanded the scope of its activities, Article III Section 9 of the DPS bylaws has been used to create 3-year special appointments to the Committee through the creation of new Subcommittees or tasks. The appointments have persisted but the officers holding them do not currently have voting rights.

As a consequence, the current DPS Committee has a sizable minority of non-voting members.

To restore equal voting rights, the Committee discussed, debated, and on March 27 2025 approved several changes to the bylaws as follows:

  • Reclassified existing special appointments as voting members. This concerns the Publication Subcommittee Chair, the Environmental Subcommittee Chair, the Nominations Subcommittee Chair, the Professional Development Subcommittee Chair and the Historian.
  • Enumerated their terms as presently being served
  • Added descriptions of new voting officers’ roles and responsibilities and enhanced past ones
  • Increased the quorum for Committee business, and specified that a majority of Committee members forming the quorum must be elected

No change will affect the committee’s ability to create new special appointments or in the duration of the terms.

The new bylaws proposed here have also been approved by the AAS Board of Trustees on 7 June 2025. 

+———————————

Send submissions to: Denise Stephens, DPS Secretary, at this address  [email protected]

You’re receiving this email because you are a DPS member. To unsubscribe or update your information, please send your request to [email protected]. The more general AAS privacy policy is available online at https://aas.org/about/policies/privacy-policy. Current and back issues of the DPS Newsletter can be found at https://dps.aas.org/newsletters

To unsubscribe from this list please go to https://lists.aas.org/confirm/?u=IcltVLtaBw4O1qXm6Duwv1XeRxoPdch3