[Board] Re: Motion: Support visit to meet with the emerging Vietnam Chapter with funding

[Howard Butler]

On Mar 8, 2010, at 1:39 PM, Tyler Mitchell (OSGeo) wrote:
> Howard, do you mind elaborating on your concerns?  I don't see a vote by
> Chris either, I'm guessing he's away.  If it's important enough to vote
> -1, then I believe there are some valuable concerns you could share.

My problems with Jeff's request are the following:

- We don't have an actual budget yet
- It opens up a rain soaked, half-frozen, moss covered roof of a slippery slope with regard to conflicts of interest
- $600 is for travel costs for two people who have as far as I can tell have no relation, contribution, or profile within OSGeo (and are still unnamed, AFAIK)
- It seems rather opportunistic and frankly looks as though OSGeo's being used as a convenient sugar daddy.  Why aren't we bootstrapping local chapter development with hard currency (plenty of soft currency -- time -- though) elsewhere?  Rather, the talk has been about local chapters bootstrapping *us* with hard currency!

Am I confident Jeff can represent OSGeo without conflict?  Absolutely.  Do I believe in the need for local chapters such as Vietnam?  Of course.  My problem is with the *exceptional* nature of this request, and it's timing in relation to our financial year.  The reason we don't have policy for sponsoring board member's travels is not because there hasn't been a desire for it, but rather because we haven't felt we've had overflowing funds to handle requests.  

That I'm the only dissenter possibly means I'm overreacting, but where we spend our money clearly indicates our priorities.  Measured against our other priorities (conference sustainability, server/website continuation, administrative overhead), this one doesn't rank so much for me.

Howard