[Board] Funding for OSGeo President to attend global FOSS4G

Mon Jul 15 14:00:37 PDT 2013

I acknowledge comments of Jeff and Peter.

I'm +1 to funding OSGeo President's travel to FOSS4G, as proposed by Peter.

On 15/07/2013 9:03 PM, Peter Batty wrote:
> Cameron,
>
> I don't think we should get into this level of detail about the 
> duties. The main specific reason the President is there (IMO) is to 
> give a talk on the state of OSGeo, and in general to be a 
> representative of OSGeo as needed (as always).
>
> I don't think that the organization of the OSGeo booth should be an 
> automatic duty of the President. We are a volunteer organization and I 
> would hope the work would be spread around. Since the President needs 
> to prepare and give a keynote talk (which I know from experience is a 
> lot of work), I would hope that in most cases we could find some other 
> volunteers to take care of the booth. I'd expect that any board 
> members who are at the show, President included, should spend some 
> time on the OSGeo booth, but I don't think that is directly related to 
> this motion.
>
> I'm okay with saying that we can fund someone else to go if the 
> President can't make it, but not sure if we need to specifically say 
> that here, the board at the time could make that decision as needed. 
> In practice I suspect that if the President couldn't make it, we would 
> probably only fund someone else to go if there wasn't a suitable 
> stand-in already planning to attend via other funding. But if the 
> general feeling is that we should add a clause like this, I would have 
> no problem with that.
>
> Cheers,
>     Peter.
>
>
> On Sun, Jul 14, 2013 at 4:00 PM, Cameron Shorter 
> <cameron.shorter at gmail.com <mailto:cameron.shorter at gmail.com>> wrote:
>
>     Peter, I'm in favor of the principle, but would like to broaden
>     the discussion before voting.
>
>     1. First, I suggest that the global FOSS4G should cover the travel
>     expenses of one OSGeo board member to attend the conference to
>     speak on behalf of OSGeo, defaulting to the OSGeo president in
>     most cases.
>
>     2. The OSGeo Advocate page has a guide for expenses here:
>     http://wiki.osgeo.org/wiki/OSGeo_Advocate#Expenses
>     This includes a speakers fee (to cover loss of wages), which can
>     be waived. I suggest that the global FOSS4G conference should
>     cover travel and expenses, but not this speakers fee. My reasoning
>     is that I think it improves the reputation of the board's
>     integrity if we are not perceived to be doing the job as a money
>     making exercise.
>
>     3. As Jeff has already volunteered to do for this conference, I
>     think that there should be an expectation upon the paid OSGeo
>     delegate to coordinate the OSGeo booth and marketing at the
>     conference.
>
>
>     On 15/07/2013 5:55 AM, Peter Batty wrote:
>>     Dear Board,
>>
>>     I (and the Nottingham LOC) just recently found out that Jeff was
>>     not going to be able to make it to FOSS4G Nottingham because of
>>     lack of funding. Steven and the LOC would really like to have
>>     Jeff there, and I would too. While I support the growth of
>>     regional events, I think there's something special about the
>>     global event and I think it's important for OSGeo that our
>>     President is there.
>>
>>     We have talked to Jeff and he has indicated that he will be able
>>     to attend if his expenses are covered. The LOC has budget for
>>     funding keynote speakers as needed, and could just go ahead and
>>     fund Jeff's attendance from that, which is a fallback option.
>>
>>     However, I'm raising this with the board as I think we should
>>     establish a principle that OSGeo should pay the President's
>>     expenses to go to the annual global conference every year (unless
>>     he or she is in a position to fund travel by other means). I
>>     think this is a very reasonable thing to do - like I said, I
>>     really think it's important for the Foundation that the President
>>     should be there each year. But it's not reasonable to expect
>>     whoever is President to fund that from their own pocket. I was
>>     opposed to automatically funding the whole board to go, just
>>     because that becomes a significantly larger expense for OSGeo and
>>     quite a number of board members, myself included, work for larger
>>     companies who are willing to fund them to attend. And while it's
>>     good to have a reasonable number of board members there, I don't
>>     think it's critical to the event to have all board members in
>>     attendance. But I do think it's really important for the
>>     President to be there.
>>
>>     Financially of course, it would ultimately amount to the same
>>     thing for OSGeo whether the LOC just approves the expense or
>>     whether the board approves this. But I think we should agree to
>>     do it on an ongoing basis.
>>
>>     Procedurally I don't know if I should propose this as a motion at
>>     the next board meeting, or whether we can just have a vote via
>>     email. Just in case, I propose a tentative motion:
>>
>>     OSGeo will refund reasonable travel and living expenses for the
>>     OSGeo President to attend the global FOSS4G conference each year.
>>     The President has the option of declining this funding if he or
>>     she can obtain funding from another source.
>>
>>     Please let me know what you think.
>>
>>     Cheers,
>>       Peter.
>>
>>
>>     _______________________________________________
>>     Board mailing list
>>     Board at lists.osgeo.org  <mailto:Board at lists.osgeo.org>
>>     http://lists.osgeo.org/mailman/listinfo/board
>
>
>     -- 
>     Cameron Shorter
>     Software and Data Solutions Manager
>     Tel: +61 (0)2 8570 5050
>     Mob: +61 (0)419 142 254
>
>     Think Globally, Fix Locally
>     Geospatial & Data Solutions enhanced with Open Standards and Open Source
>     http://www.lisasoft.com
>
>

-- 
Cameron Shorter
Software and Data Solutions Manager
Tel: +61 (0)2 8570 5050
Mob: +61 (0)419 142 254

Think Globally, Fix Locally
Geospatial & Data Solutions enhanced with Open Standards and Open Source
http://www.lisasoft.com

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