Oklahoma Pharmacists Association

A nonprofit, incorporated May 28, 1890, and reincorporated on February 10, in accordance with the laws of the State of Oklahoma

BYLAWS

Article I

Name and Location

1. The name of the incorporated association shall be the Oklahoma Pharmaceutical Association, doing business as Oklahoma Pharmacists Association.
2. Its permanent, principal office shall be located at Oklahoma City and any association office located elsewhere shall be conducted in such a manner as to consolidate with the principal office at the direction of the Executive Council.

Article II

Aims and Purposes

1. The aims and purposes of this association shall be dedicated to the health, welfare, and safety of the people of Oklahoma.
2. These objectives shall include the furtherance of service to the public health by advancing and improving the science and arts of pharmacy through education and research of manufacturing, processing, compounding, dispensing, sale and delivery of medicinal substances by qualified, registered pharmacists.
3. It shall be the further aim of this association to promote mutual fellowship and friendship among pharmacists and between pharmacists and members of the related, recognized medical professions, as well as the general public.

Article III

Membership

1. The membership of this association shall consist of the following classifications:
   1. Active Membership: Any person of good and moral and professional standing who is licensed as a registered assistant pharmacist in Oklahoma shall be eligible for active membership with all rights, privileges and benefits attendant thereto, except that only registered pharmacists shall be eligible to hold office. Dues for all members shall be determined annually by the Executive Council, and for active members shall not be less than sixty dollars ($60), except that dues for pharmacists during their first year of licensure shall be determined by the Executive Council.
   2. Associate Members: All licensed drug store owners, pharmaceutical representatives, pharmacy interns and teachers in recognized schools of pharmacy who are not licensed to practice in Oklahoma shall be eligible for associate membership with all rights, privileges and benefits attendant thereto, except those of voting and holding office. Annual dues for associate members shall not be less than thirty dollars ($30).
   3. Affiliate members: Any service wholesaler druggist, drug manufacturer, or vendor serving the trade of Oklahoma whose current dues of not less than eighty five dollars ($85) have been paid to the association, shall be eligible for affiliate membership, and shall be entitled to any annual certificate attesting to such membership, and to all rights, privileges and benefits of membership, except those rights of voting and holding office.
   4. Honorary Members: Any person, firm or organization whom the association shall from time to time see fit to honor with membership shall, without payment of dues, be eligible for honorary membership, and shall hold such membership at the will of the association; provided that such members may be appointed only by the unanimous vote of the Executive Council in regular session or by majority vote of the active members assembled at the annual state convention.
   5. Pharmacy Members: Any active member or licensed retail drug store who shall for the purpose of providing necessary additional funds for maintenance of the association office and all necessary expenses of operance of the aims of the association, pay an additional membership fee of not less than eighty five dollars ($85) annually, and whose current fee is paid, shall be eligible for sustaining membership, and shall be entitled to all other rights and privileges and benefits of membership, provided that this section shall not confer on anyone the right to vote or hold office in the association.
   6. Student Members: Any student regularly enrolled in either of the colleges/schools of pharmacy in Oklahoma shall be eligible for student membership, with all the rights and privileges attendant thereto except those of voting and holding office. Annual dues for student membership shall not be less than three dollars ($3).
   7. Retired or Inactive Members: Any retired, or permanently disabled, pharmacist who has previously been a member of the Oklahoma Pharmacists Association, may petition the Executive Council for a retired or inactive membership. Such membership would provide the recipient with all rights, privileges, and benefits of active membership except holding office. This type of membership would require approval of the Executive Council, and payment of dues one-half (1/2) times the dues of active membership.
   8. Husband and Wife Pharmacists: Total dues for husband and wife pharmacists shall be at the rate of one and a half times the rate for active members. All rights and privileges of membership shall be available to this category; however, mailings will be sent to one address carrying both names.
   9. Life Members: Life membership may be granted to any individual judged to have rendered outstanding service to the association upon unanimous vote of the Executive Council, without payment of dues, provided such person has been a registered pharmacist for at least fifty (50) years, and has been an active member of the association for at least thirty-five (35) years. In specific cases, wherein the Executive Council judges the services so meritorious as deserving of immediate recognition, the qualifications listed above may be waived. The privileges of life members shall be the same as for active members except to vote or hold office.
   10. Pharmacy Technicians: Any person of good and moral and professional standing who has been issued a permit as a pharmacy technician in the state of Oklahoma shall be eligible for pharmacy technician membership, with all the rights and privileges attendant thereto except those of voting and holding office. Annual dues for pharmacy technician members shall not be less than thirty dollars ($30).

Article IV

Officers

1. Effective June, 1994, the officers of this association shall be a president, president elect, a vice president, an immediate past president, and an executive director-treasurer, each of whom, with the exception of the Executive Director-Treasurer, shall be an active member of the association. The Executive Council may at its pleasure separate the offices of executive director-treasurer.
2. No member of the State Board of Pharmacy shall hold office in the association during his/her tenure of office on said board, except the representative of the State Board of Pharmacy, who shall be a member of the Executive Council as hereinafter designated in Article VI, Paragraph 1, nor shall the dean of any school of pharmacy hold office in the association during the period of his deanship.
3. All of the officers of this association, with the exception of the Executive Director-Treasurer, shall be elected to office in the manner hereinafter set out.
   1. Executive Officers. Effective January, 1995, the membership shall annually elect a vice president. Said vice president shall take office at the next state convention subsequent to his/her election, and upon his/her assumption of office all other officers, except the Immediate Past President, shall move up one rank, with the President Elect becoming President, and the Vice President becoming President Elect. Such order of succession for executive officers shall be permanent.
      1. In the event of a vacancy by reason of death, disability, resignation or removal, all officers shall move up one rank, and the nominating committee nominate and the membership shall elect at the next regular election both a vice president and a president elect, provided, however, that if such vacancy is the office of the President, the President Elect shall serve both the unexpired term and his/her full regular term; and only the office of Vice President shall be filled at the next regular election.
   2. Candidates for executive office shall be nominated by a nominating committee appointed by the President, and approved by the Executive Council, consisting of not less than five (5) members. Each nominee for executive office shall have been an active member of the association for at least three (3) years. At least two (2) candidates shall be nominated for such office to be filled, and these nominees shall have been interviewed by the committee to determine their ability and willingness to serve if elected. Nominees shall be named in sufficient time to allow for preparation of the ballot. Nominations from the membership shall be made directly to the nominating committee.
   3. Voting shall be by mail ballot or by an electronic-Internet voting system.
   4. Each year the Executive Director shall prepare ballots containing names of all candidates nominated by the Nominating Committee, and there shall be provided a space for a write in candidate for each office to be filled. Said ballots shall be mailed by first class mail or made available on the association’s official website to all association members eligible to vote. When using mail ballots the smaller envelope shall contain no marking of any kind and shall be capable of being sealed. After designating his/her choices, the voter shall seal his/her ballot in the unmarked envelope. He/She shall place the sealed ballot in the larger envelope and return the same to the executive director. The return envelope shall contain the name, address and certificate number in the upper left hand corner. To be counted, ballots must be returned to the Executive Director by the date specified on the ballot, which shall be at least a minimum of thirty (30) days after the original mailing date to the voter. When using an electronic-Internet voting system, the association shall maintain the privacy of individual’s votes and shall prevent eligible voters from voting more than once for any given ballot, while preventing non-eligible persons from voting. Voting shall be allowed on the association’s website until the date specified by the website and other means of advertisement.
   5. After receiving the completed mail-based ballots, the Executive Director shall check the return envelopes for voter eligibility and postmark date. All ballots appearing to be invalid shall be segregated and turned over to the Tabulating Committee. The remaining return envelopes shall be opened, and the unmarked sealed envelopes shall be submitted for counting to the appointed committee that has been approved by the Executive Council. When the association so chooses to utilize an electronic-Internet voting system, the association’s Webmaster shall provide the Executive Director with a computer-generated and accurate report of online votes while maintaining voter privacy.
   6. Candidates receiving the highest number of votes cast for each office, including write in votes, shall be declared the winners.
   7. Results of the election shall be announced by the President at the annual convention.
4. Election of persons to the eligible list for membership on the State Board of Pharmacy shall be held in the following manner:
   1. Each pharmaceutical district shall select two (2) nominees at its annual meeting. Nominators and nominees shall be residents of the district in which the nomination is made except on petition to the Executive Council, which may grant exceptions. Any nominee for the eligible list for appointments to the State Board of Pharmacy shall be a graduate of an accredited college or school of pharmacy and shall meet the qualifications specified in the Oklahoma state law. Each Executive District may adopt its own method of selecting its nominees, either by a nominating committee report, or by its own mail ballot system, or by another means that shall be pre-approved by the Executive Committee; voting shall be carried out prior to their annual meeting. It is suggested that balloting on the nominees be done by secret ballot and that each qualified elector vote for only one (1) candidate with the two (2) nominees receiving the greatest number of votes considered the said district's nominees. Nominations shall be open from July 1 through August 31, and open to all pharmacists in the district. There will be two (2) nominees from each of the ten (10) OPhA districts, plus two (2) from OSHP, two (2) from PPOK, two (2) from the Oklahoma Chapter of ASCP and two (2) from the Oklahoma Association of Chain Drug Stores. This would make a total of twenty-eight (28) nominees. No pharmacist shall be a nominee from more than one (1) organization or district. If a district uses a mail ballot system to select their nominees, all pharmacists in the district will be given the chance to vote on their district's nominees.
   2. Each nominee shall submit in writing, on a form provided by the association office, a brief biographical sketch giving qualifications and achievements, along with their photograph, to the Executive Director of the Oklahoma Pharmacists Association within ten (10) days of receiving the form. These qualifications and achievements, with each nominee's picture will be made known to all members of the profession by publication in the Oklahoma Pharmacist magazine, and sent to voters with the Board of Pharmacy ballot.
   3. The names of the nominees shall be forwarded to the Executive Director at the conclusion of the district meetings.
   4. Ballots shall be prepared and distributed or an electronic-Internet voting system shall be placed on the association’s website no later than March 1 each year in the manner and form prescribed for the election of officers of the Oklahoma Pharmacists Association, except that no provisions shall be made for write in notes and none shall be counted. Only those ballots with ten (10) names selected shall be counted. All other ballots shall be considered invalid. Voters shall include all Oklahoma pharmacists that are residents of the state.
   5. Ballots or a Webmaster’s computer-generated voting report shall be received by the Executive Director by the date specified on the ballot, which shall be at least a minimum of thirty (30) days after the original mailing date to the voter. The tabulation and counting procedures of said ballots shall be placed in the hands of a committee appointed by the President and approved by the Executive Council. It is further provided that any ballots appearing to be invalid shall be segregated and designated as such.
   6. All valid ballots shall be counted by the appointed committee prior to the annual convention, with the results being announced by the President during said convention.
   7. The ten (10) persons receiving the highest number of votes shall be elected to the eligible list. In the event of a tie for tenth place, the tie shall be broken by a coin toss, witnessed by the Tabulating Committee.
5. Duties of the President. It shall be the duty of the President to call and preside over all meetings of the association and of its Executive Council; he/she shall have general supervision over the affairs of the association and over the other officers in the performance of their duties as hereinafter prescribed; he/she shall sign written contracts of the association as directed by the Executive Council; he/she shall be an ex-officio member of all committees; and shall perform such other duties as are incident to his/her office. In the event of his/her absence or disability, his/her duties shall be performed by the President Elect and the Vice President, in order of succession. In all balloting, the President shall not vote while presiding unless the right to relinquish the chair to actively advocate or oppose questions before the house, and while on the floor, shall have the right to vote on such questions as may arise. He/She also, in the event of a tie, must cast the deciding vote. He/She shall have the further duty and responsibility of conveying to the Executive Director the will and the mandate of the Executive Council. At the annual state convention at the close of his/her term of office, he/she shall present to the convention a report of the operations of the association during his/her term, together with his/her recommendations for the general welfare of the association.
6. Duties of the President Elect. The President Elect shall be a voting member of the Executive Council and an ex-officio member of all committees; he/she shall automatically become the President of the association at the expiration of the current term of the regularly elected president, and it shall be his/her duty and responsibility to acquaint himself/herself with the duties and responsibilities of the office of the President and with the needs and requirements of the association.
7. Duties of the Vice President. The Vice President shall be a voting member of the Executive Council, and shall in succession act in the absence of the President and President Elect in their stead. The Vice President shall be chairman of one of the standing committees of the association at the pleasure of the President. (Each vice president in office as of June 21, 1992 shall serve until the vice president position is vacant and ready to be filled by an election)
8. Duties of the Immediate Past President. The Immediate Past President shall be an ex-officio member of all committees, and shall render advice and assistance in all phases of association management and operation. He/She shall be a voting member of the Executive Council.
9. Duties of the Executive Director.
   1. Clerical. It shall be the duties of the Executive Director to conduct all official correspondence, to preserve all books, documents and communications, to maintain an accurate record of the proceedings of the Executive Council and of all committee meetings; he/she shall be custodian of the corporate seal, and shall attest with his/her signature and impress with the seal all written contracts of the association; he/she shall be custodian of certificates of membership or such other evidence of membership as shall be provided, and shall reissue such evidence only on receipt of a statement from the requesting member, setting forth the reasons for the reissue, together with payment of such charge as the Executive Director shall make, as directed by the Executive Council. The Executive Director shall have general supervision over all employees of the association, shall fix their salaries, subject to the approval of the Executive Council, and shall have the authority to dismiss and replace such employees. It shall be his/her further duty to issue notice of all meetings of the association by publication of the date, time, and place of such meetings in the preceding issue of the Oklahoma Pharmacist, and to issue notice of all meetings of the Executive Council by like publication and also by mailing or transmitting electronically a copy of said notice to each member of the Executive Council and to such other persons as the President shall direct, and said notice to be postmarked not less then ten (10) days prior to the meeting. The Executive Director shall superintend and edit the publication of the Oklahoma Pharmacist, the official publication of the association with copies of each publication insofar as revenue shall permit, and the Executive Director shall provide for this and other purposes, a roll of names and addresses of the members of the association; he/she shall also superintend and edit such other publication as the Executive Council shall direct.
   2. Fiscal. The Executive Director shall receive all funds of the association from all persons and sources whatsoever, and in proper form showing the amount and the source, he/she shall make disbursements from the funds of the association by voucher check, with a statement thereon of the payee and purpose for the expenditure; he/she may draw on the treasury for a petty cash account for incidental expense. It shall be his/her duty to keep regular accounts of the financial concerns of the association, and he/she shall render a complete statement of receipts and disbursements, a copy of which statement shall be presented to all officers and members of the Executive Council as its regular meeting, for approval. He/She shall secure prior approval of the Executive Council before making any expenditure for capital improvements or additions to the association property or equipment, and he shall maintain a perpetual inventory of property and equipment owned by the association. The records and books of the association shall be kept in the permanent office of the association, under the custodianship and care of the Executive Director, and shall be open to inspection by any member of the association during business hours.
   3. Policy. The Executive Director shall be an ex-officio member of all committees and shall notify members of committees of their election or appointment and of the times, dates, and places of committee meetings, and shall furnish each with the names and addresses of their association on their respective committees. The Executive Director shall, in the name of the association, as recommended by the legislative committee, and as directed by the Executive Council, support any and all legislation which shall be beneficial to the public, and to the pharmaceutical profession, and by the same token, he/she shall, as directed by the Executive Council, actively oppose that legislation deemed detrimental to the public and to the profession.
   4. Miscellaneous. The employment of the Executive Director shall be at the discretion of the Executive Council, who shall contract with the Executive Director from year to year, provided, however, that the Executive Council may grant a contract for three (3) years, and provided further that any such contract shall be subject to termination on ninety days (90) notice by action of the Executive Council in regular session. The Executive Council shall determine the salary to be paid to the Executive Director, which salary shall be paid by the association. The Executive Director shall bind himself to the association by a surety bond in an amount to be fixed by the Executive Council, which shall not be less than five thousand dollars ($5000), the cost of which bond shall be paid by the association, and he/she shall not enter upon the execution of his duties as aforesaid until such bond is approved by the Executive Council.

Article V

Finance and Accounting

1. The association is not formed for profit and no dividend shall ever be declared. The funds of the association shall be deposited in the bank or other depository designed by the Executive Council as the official depository, and the funds shall be withdrawn by voucher check signed by the Executive Director, subject to approval by the Executive Council in regular session.
2. The income and receipts of the association shall be rendered in accounts from each source of revenue and such other account as the Executive Council from time to time shall direct, each subject to report to be rendered to the Executive Council for approval in regular session. To wit:
   1. All dues of whatever classification and all miscellaneous contributions except as hereinafter provided.
   2. Proceeds from the publication of the Oklahoma Pharmacist, provided, however, that special contributions made for the use of particular projects designated by the Executive Council, shall not be considered a part of the general funds of the association, and shall be disbursed subject to the approval of the Executive Council, and provided further that there shall be an accounting of said funds only when directed by the Executive Council. Upon completion of the special project for which the funds were contributed, any unexpected funds shall be at the disposal of the Executive Council.
3. At its first regular meeting prior to the new fiscal year, the Executive Council shall prepare a budget for the coming year and shall certify the same to the Executive Director for information and guidance, and said budget shall regulate the disbursement of association funds in all instances, provided, however, that the Executive Council in regular session shall have the power and authority to make such transfers from unexpended accounts to other established accounts as necessary and proper.
4. The Executive Council shall have the accounts of the association audited by an independent certified public accountant or an audit committee appointed by the President, at least biannually.

Article VI

Executive Council

1. Effective July, 2007, the Executive Council shall be composed of seventeen (17) members, namely the President, President Elect, Vice President, the Immediate Past President, a representative of the State Board of Pharmacy, a representative from Pharmacy Providers of Oklahoma, the Executive Director of the Oklahoma Pharmacists Association, who shall have no vote, and one (1) member from each of the following Executive Districts as hereinafter provided.
2. There shall be ten (10) Executive Districts, comprised of the counties of this state as follows:

First Executive District:
Tulsa, Creek, Washington

Second Executive District:
Adair, Craig, Muskogee, Rogers, Wagoner, Ottawa, Okmulgee, Sequoyah, Nowata, Delaware, Mayes, and Cherokee

Third Executive District:
Le Flore, Okfuskee, Hughes, Latimer, McIntosh, Coal, Pittsburg, and Haskell

Fourth Executive District:
Carter, Pontotoc, Pottawatomie, Garvin, Marshall, Johnston, Lincoln, Cleveland, Murray, Love, Seminole, and McClain

Fifth Executive District:
Oklahoma

Sixth Executive District:
Caddo, Stephens, Grady, Jefferson, Canadian, Comanche, and Cotton

Seventh Executive District:
Roger Mills, Washita, Jackson, Custer, Kiowa, Harmon, Beckham, Greer, and Tillman

Eighth Executive District:
Garfield, Kingfisher, Osage, Grant, Logan, Pawnee, Kay, Noble, and Payne

Ninth Executive District:
Cimarron, Harper, Ellis, Woodward, Texas, Woods, Dewey, Alfalfa, Beaver, Major, and ?