2026 Proposed Bylaws Changes

The MDA Board of Directors is acting on the recommendations of the Constitution & Bylaws and Nominating Committee in proposing a number of changes to the existing Bylaws.  Why?

First, the last major review of the Constitution & Bylaws was a decade ago.  Life has changed.  Second, the 2025-2027 MDA Strategic Plan directed the Committee to analyze the Bylaws after a number of years of only very minor changes. This effort involved the Constitution, Bylaws & Nominating Committee, Executive Committee, Board of Directors, ADA, legal counsel, and peer states and groups. 

What you will see in the linked documents are the proposed changes.  While the changes seem to be numerous, we do not believe they are significant, rather, more of a clean-up and reorganization, with notable exceptions below.  However, even those changes should not have major impact.

We are providing the specifics of the changes on this website, as well as speaking to these changes at each of the districts meeting before the Annual Meeting.  We will include this reference in the next MDA News and with a separate e-mail.  We are also planning webinars April 29 and 30 to follow up.  Finally, these will be presented at the May 28 General Assembly in Missoula for consideration, discussion, and voting.  The current Constitution and Bylaws are linked on the prior page and here for quick reference.

Constitution & Bylaws Merger

The first major focus of this document is merging the Constitution and Bylaws.  Many organizations do not have both documents - and some that do have both are merging them as we propose to do.  Bylaws are the customary legal document for most organizations. The MDA Constitution and Bylaws include a lot of repetition or direction to "see the other document". The only need for separate documents is if a constitution includes provisions that are not found in bylaws or have a higher standard of amendment.  There are no such different provisions nor standards between the MDA Constitution and Bylaws. As you will see in the accompanying document, we have basically kept almost all the language from the Constitution and merged it into the Bylaws. The Constitution can easily be merged into the Bylaws for brevity and clarity and to avoid contradiction.  To review this specific change, please click below.

Click here for Constitution & Bylaws Merger details

Bylaws Changes

General: Before moving into specifics, there are numerous nomenclature and grammatical changes.  Montana Dental Association is shortened to MDA after the start, as is American Dental Association.  "Local component district dental society" or "societies" is shortened to "district(s)" after the start.  Almost everyone refers to them as districts already. These constitute over 200 changes alone and have no impact on the organization!  As far as any grammatical or cosmetic changes, we think we caught them all.  Let us know!

The proposed changes in the linked document are predicated on approval of the Constitution & Bylaws merger noted above. Any significant changes are noted and explained in a yellow text below each change.

Membership: The first significant change is to the Article on Membership, the ultimate authority of the MDA.  Here are some highlights:

  • Moving dues language to the Article on Dues
  • Restoring Active Life Member discount on dues to 50%
  • Changing "Associate" member to "Affiliate" member
  • Removing the Provisional member category
  • Changing Peer Review "Committee" to "Panel"
  • Removing repetitious Reinstatement language from "Expulsion"
  • Setting refund policy

General Assembly: The next significant change is moving the Article in the Bylaws concerning General Assembly forward in the document - from near the end to near the front.  This makes sense from a hierarchical sense, as the General Assembly is the governing body of the MDA.  The Article in the Constitution also placed the General Assembly ahead of the Board of Directors.  The only changes to the Article are:

  • Giving members authority to call a General Assembly
  • Renaming "Secretary-Treasurer" position

Board, Executive Committee, Officers, and Delegates: As noted above, one of the biggest changes here is restoring the "Secretary-Treasurer" title and status as an officer and member of the EC.  We have found the change from five years ago is not as advantageous as we had hoped.  Other changes here:

  • Clarifying Officers can make and second motions, although they still cannot vote
  • Coordinating notification of nominations matches notification of changes to Bylaws
  • Setting EC meeting requirements
  • Clarifying Officer and Delegate terms, duties, and election

Committees: Changes include:

  • Revising terms to one year and removing limits on members
  • Renaming several committees
  • Removing two inactive committees
  • Making Special Committees a section of the Article on Committees, rather than its own Article

Board of Dentistry and Seals: We are eliminating these two articles as explained in the document.

Again, this may seem like a lot of changes - and it is.  We do not feel they change the mission or operation of the MDA, mostly shorten and modernize the document.

Click here for Bylaws changes

 

 

We will also offer two "Town Halls" to take any questions or comments April 29 & 30 at 6 PM.  The link for both is https://us02web.zoom.us/j/83530099343?pwd=FMCC3wM6xvENW1k6KSubTyaGVYW7ax.1.  Of course, we are happy to take any questions or comments before the May 28 General Assembly.  Contact MDA Executive Director Webb Brown at 406-431-9508 or Webb@MontanaDental.org anytime.