How Community Boards Work

Each NewVistas community of around 100,000 people is served by a community public service, a voluntary body organized into presidencies. Some presidencies, due to the nature of their responsibilities, belong to demographic presidencies and boards, providing extensive avenues for cooperation.

With this structure in place, every decision of any consequence in a community goes through one or more boards of 12. Each board has specific duties, but they all follow the same procedure for conducting board meetings and reviewing decisions.

Conducting Board Meetings

No hierarchy or seniority exists within any board of 12, which enables all board members to contribute equally. For the sake of order during meetings, the 12 individuals each take a turn conducting board meetings. These turns are determined by an app according to alphabetical first names.

Board meetings take place every first thursday of the month from 10:00AM. Seating during board meetings is random, with no seniority or other hierarchy. A meeting conductor’s main tasks include setting the meeting agenda, calling on board members to speak, and making sure each speaker gets a certain amount of uninterrupted time.

In addition, the person who takes minutes rotates with each board meeting by alphabetical last name, so one person’s opinions do not skew the minutes over time.

Types of boards

These are the different boards in a community