RESOLVED
Shareowners ask our board, to the fullest extent permitted by law, to amend our governing documents to allow shareowners to make board nominations as follows:
1. The Company proxy statement, form of proxy, and voting instruction forms shall include, listed with the board’s nominees, alphabetically by last name, nominees of:
a. Any party of one or more shareowners that has collectively held, continuously for two years, at least one percent but less than five percent of the Company’s securities eligible to vote for the election of directors, and/or
b. Any party of shareowners of whom 25 or more have each held continuously for two years a number of shares of the Company’s stock that, at some point within the preceding 60 days, was worth at least $2,000 and collectively at least one percent but less than five percent of the Company’s securities eligible to vote for the election of directors.
2. For any board election, no shareowner may be a member of more than one such nominating party. Board members and officers of the Company may not be members of any such party.
3. Parties nominating under 1(a) may collectively, and parties nominating under 1(b) may collectively, make nominations numbering up to 24% of the company’s board of directors. If either group should exceed its 24% limit, opportunities to nominate shall be distributed among parties in that group as evenly as possible.
4. If necessary, preference among 1(a) nominators will be shown to those holding the greatest number of the Company’s shares for at least two years, and preference among 1(b) nominators will be shown to those with the greatest number who have each held continuously for one year a number of shares of the Company’s stock that, at some point within the preceding 60 days, was worth at least $2,000.
5. Nominees may include in the proxy statement a 500 word supporting statement.
6. Each proxy statement or special meeting notice to elect board members shall include instructions for nominating under these provisions, fully explaining all legal requirements for nominators and nominees under federal law, state law and the company’s governing documents.
Supporting Statement
The current nomination process is self-perpetuating. As a result, directors have little accountability to shareholders, which may have some relationship to the fact that our bank has been and continues to be subject to extensive litigation and multimillion dollar lawsuits.
Access to the company proxy has long been considered the most direct and cost effective method of allowing shareowners a meaningful role in the nomination process, and research conducted at the Harvard Business School shows financial markets place a statistically significant positive value on shareholder access.[1]
Shareholders have argued for more than ten years that, “entrenched managers and directors will only improve corporate governance when they can be held accountable, e.g., voted out of office and replaced with directors chosen by shareholders.”