The only issues I have with the site at present are the lack of transparency surrounding the banning of members and alterations to the Terms of Service after the fact.
I my mind, the resolution is simple: provide a concise explanatory statement whenever a ban takes place. Something along these lines:
Member xxxx has been banned until some date (or permanently) for violating Section ### of the LPSG Terms of Service.
I understand the concern in outing underage users. As such, a minor change to the labeling of the ToS would alleviate this concern. The first four bullets in Section 2 are, in my opinion, account violations that could be collectively labeled Section 2(a). The remaining three offenses in section 2, along with the seven enumerated offenses in section 3, are operational in nature and should be labeled 2(b) through 2(d) and 3(a) through 3(g), respectively. New line items should obviously follow suit.
This flows into my concerns about the alterations of the ToS document itself. There is presently no history available, so unless members make daily snapshots of it, nobody can really know for sure what changes or when. Iterating a version number with each new release, making a revision history public, and perhaps highlighting the most recent changes from the last version would go a long way.
Personally, I'd also like to see complete transparency when a member is banned, including the person who initiated or recommended the vote, as well as how each moderator voted (or abstained). I believe that if those with the power to censure feel strongly enough about a member's behavior to remove them from the community, then they should have no problem having their convictions on the record...and the same goes for regular members who call for others to be banned.
In addition to quelling fears of people being banned for personal or other unjust reasons, it spells out by example which behaviors will not be tolerated in the community.
Implementation is simple and flexible:
First, relabel the bullets in the ToS.
As to making the ban process information available, the simplest mechanism of all would be to provide the data only upon request. This could be problematic as some mods undoubtedly would be inundated with a disproportionate share of these requests, and many requests would come in for info on the same person's banning.
Another idea would be to create a new area for ban reports, with each being a locked topic containing the information items (similar to the TOS) I discussed earlier.
This could be augmented by replacing the banned member's signature line with the simple statement about their being banned. That statement could link to the topic in the Banned Users forum that contains the details of the initiation and votes for the ban.
This all seems complex as I type it out, but viewed in light of the fact that bans are (and should be) few and far between, it shouldn't actually amount to much effort. The rewards would include a much calmer user population and a much greater sense of trust in the moderation staff and their processes.