CBA invites Officer and Board nominations for the 2023-2024 bar year

The Chicago Bar Association is soliciting nominations for available Officer and Board of Manager positions.

If your CBA dues are paid up, you probably got a notice about this. And probably deleted it, too. But I'm currently retired... so, just this once, I read it... and now I have questions.

The CBA says it is inviting nominations for Second Vice President, Secretary, Treasurer and eight postions on the Board of Managers where incumbents are rotating off.

That sounds -- to me, anyway -- like a suggestion for Perry Mason to nominate Hamilton Burger, or Grace Van Owen to nominate Ally McBeal, or (making a probably futile attempt at sounding contemporary here) Diane Lockhart to nominate Lucca Quinn. Right? Isn't that how nominations work? Person A suggests that Person B would be a splendid choice. Person B would not necessarily know anything about it. At least not right away.

But the notice then provides that these supposed 'nominees' must complete and return candidate questionnaires by a date certain (February 21 at 5:00 p.m. for Officer positions, February 28 at 5:00 p.m. for Board of Managers hopefuls).

Well. Questionnaires? That sounds suspiciously like an application form. So not nominations at all, but more like choosing teams for basketball in gym class, with everyone yelling pick me!, pick me!

Maybe this is just another of those musty old Boomer conventions that will fall by the wayside as we depart over the horizon... but I thought it was considered a tad unseemly to 'nominate' oneself.

And there may be some vestige of this feeling reflected in the bylaws and procedures of the CBA because there will be an open meeting on March 9, 2023, starting at 4:30 p.m., at which nominations will be received "from members of the Association as to candidates for Officer and Board of Managers positions." So if Person B can persuade Person A to show up and make the nomination, appearances may still be maintained. Except that everyone on the Nominating Committee would necessarily know that Person B completed the questionnaires... won't they?

And then, on March 30, also beginning at 4:30 p.m., all Officer and Board "candidates" (the word "nominee" is not used at this point in the original memo) will be invited to "schedule a brief appearance before the Nominating Committee." Which sounds a lot like an invitation to give a campaign speech as opposed to a blushing nominee's expected comment (something along the lines of "who, me?").

Perhaps it's just as well I never read one of these notices before. Anyway, this year's CBA Nominating Committee consists of:

• Hon. Maryam Ahmad, Chair
• Edward J. Austin
• Daniel Berkowitz
• Michelle L. Carey
• J. Timothy Eaton
• Gail S. Eisenberg
• Noah J. Graf
• Erika Harold
• Andre Hunter, Jr.
• Eileen Letts
• Hon. Clare E. McWilliams
• Juan Morado, Jr.
• Kathleen Dillon Narko
• Gavin S. Phelps
• Donata Stroink-Skillrud
• Hon. E. Kenneth Wright, Jr.
• Michael J. Zink

To receive a questionnaire, or if you plan to appear or have someone nominate you at the March 9 meeting, please email Beth McMeen at bmcmeen@chicagobar.org or Michele Spodarek at mspodarek@chicagobar.org.