Minutes of the MLA Delegate Assembly

The Delegate Assembly MET on 29 December 2009 at the Philadelphia Marriott Hotel. First Vice President Sidonie Smith presided. The assembly was called to order at 1:16 p.m. The chair recognized Delegate Ana-María Medina, who made a statement recognizing the life and work of Chris Bell, a fellow delegate who had died just before the convention. The chair asked all in attendance to stand for a moment of remembrance. The chair then made preliminary announcements about the conduct of the meeting, called for a demonstration of the electronic voting system to be used during the meeting and an explanation of the warning-light system that had been installed at the podium to let speakers know how much of their allotted time remained, and noted that she would be exercising her right to vote during the meeting. She announced the quorum for the meeting, which was 80 delegates, because 159 delegates had signed in for the meeting at the beginning. [Note: of the 272 delegates, 189 (69%) attended all or part of the meeting (see the list that follows for the names of the delegates in attendance).]