SEC to Reconsider Workplace Resolutions

The Securities and Exchange Commission next month will vote on a package of rules to change the process by which shareholders bring up resolutions for votes at annual meetings and will review a related, controversial ruling on workplace resolutions. SEC staff will present the agency’s commissioners with proposals aimed at revamping the process by which companies omit or include shareholder resolutions on the proxy statements that list issues to be voted on at annual meetings. SEC official William Morley said the new set of rules will address a controversial 1992 decision in which the SEC allowed Cracker Barrel Old Country Store Inc. to omit from a proxy statement a proposal to bar job discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation. That interpretation set a precedent that put proposals relating to nondiscriminatory hiring or equal employment out of the reach of shareholder resolutions. Companies rely on SEC rules and sometimes seek SEC approval in determining which shareholder resolutions will be omitted from proxy statements, thereby preventing a shareholder vote on the some resolutions. The agency will consider the package of revisions at a September open meeting.