[Board] Proposed process for selecting OSGeo charter members

[Cameron Shorter]

OSGeo board,
In the interests of making a decision such that Jorge Salinas (our CRO) 
can move forward, I propose the following process be followed for voting 
new charter members in 2014:

1. Charter member to nominate potential new charter member(s) (as before).

2. Charter members then vote (in/out) nominated charter members. This 
will be different to prior years, as we previously voted in a fixed 
number of members for a larger selection pool. (eg vote in 20 people 
from a list of 30). For this year, I propose we have a "Yes/No" vote. 
Ie, if we have a list of 30 candidates, we will ask all charter members 
to vote Yes or No against each candidate. Each candidate with greater 
than 50% of YES votes will be included as new charter members.

3. Charter members would be guided to select candidates who fit the 
"Positive Attributes for Charter Members" as defined here: 
http://wiki.osgeo.org/wiki/Membership_Process#Positive_Attributes

4. There will be no limit to the number of new charter members who can 
be selected. This will require an update of 
http://wiki.osgeo.org/wiki/Membership_Process

5. Note: This vote is being put to the board and not to charter members 
as I don't wish to complicate this decision by adding a 2nd (positive) 
idea for change. We can address getting charter members to vote on 
issues as a separate motion.

Board members, can you please all vote on above:

+1 Cameron



On 25/06/2014 9:31 pm, Cameron Shorter wrote:
> Following the community discussion, I further researched OSGeo's 
> foundation documents, (in retrospect I should have done this earlier).
>
> Of particular relevance to current discussion is our ByLaws:
>
> http://www.osgeo.org/content/foundation/incorporation/bylaws.html
> /Section 7.1. Admission of [Charter] Members. An initial group of up 
> to forty-five (45) persons shall be admitted as the initial [charter] 
> members of the corporation upon the affirmative vote of the Board of 
> Directors of the corporation. Thereafter, to be eligible for [charter] 
> membership, a person must be nominated by an existing [charter] member 
> of the corporation pursuant to a written document in such form as 
> shall be adopted by the Board of Directors from time to time. The 
> nomination must be included in a notice to the [charter] members at 
> least ten (10) days in advance of the meeting at which the [charter] 
> members will vote on the applicant's admission. Proposed [charter] 
> members shall be admitted upon the affirmative vote of the members of 
> the corporation./
>
> This section implies that the proposal below of automatically 
> accepting "Recognised OSGeo Community Leaders" is unconstitutional, as 
> charter members need to be voted into the role by existing charter 
> members.
>
> It also implies that while a separate paid membership category could 
> be created, paid members would still need to be voted into a charter 
> member role by existing charter members.
>
> The ByLaws don't mention limiting the number of new charter members. 
> This criteria seems to have been introduced as a Membership Process by 
> the 26th Board meeting:
> http://wiki.osgeo.org/wiki/Membership_Process
> /The number of new members will be between 10% and one third of the 
> existing charter membership count as decided by the board/.
>
> Such a statement created by the board, could be updated by the board, 
> and as such the board could agree to accept an unlimited number of new 
> charter members.
>
> So I'm now thinking that our election process can be simplified to:
>
> 1. Charter member to nominate potential new charter member(s)
> 2. Charter members then vote (in/out) against all nominated charter 
> members
> A suitable criteria for determining whether a nominee qualifies is 
> listed here: 
> http://wiki.osgeo.org/wiki/Membership_Process#Positive_Attributes
> 4. Nominees with a majority of votes are included as new Charter Members
>
> On 15/06/2014 9:52 am, Cameron Shorter wrote:
>> Within 2 weeks we intend to start our annual process for selecting 
>> new OSGeo charter members.
>>
>> In previous years the Charter Member selection process has been a 
>> little contentious. We typically receive numerous nominations from 
>> high caliber members of our community, and insufficient positions to 
>> accept them all. This typically results in unnecessary disappointment 
>> and dissent.
>>
>> In response, the OSGeo board has agreed to trial tweaking the voting 
>> process. The aim is to automatically accept recognised OSGeo 
>> community leaders, while continuing with our existing process which 
>> attracts the many valuable community members who contribute in other 
>> ways. Community comments are encouraged, and will be considered over 
>> the next week.
>>
>> *Design guidelines:*
>>
>> * We want a process which is simple to understand and implement.
>> * We want a process which encourages recognised OSGeo community 
>> leaders to become OSGeo charter members, while continuing to accept 
>> members from the many other valuable OSGeo roles.
>> * We want a process which is difficult to abuse.
>> * For the first iteration, we should err on being more selective in 
>> our criteria, with potential widening of selection criteria in future 
>> years.
>>
>> *Recognised OSGeo Community Leaders**
>> *
>> OSGeo aims to provide OSGeo Charter Membership to all recognised 
>> OSGeo community leaders who are nominated. Hopefully, sufficient 
>> positions are available. If there are more candidates than available, 
>> then membership will be allocated to the first to be nominated. 
>> Remaining nominees will be automatically offered to go through the 
>> standard voting process.
>> Recognised OSGeo Community Leaders are defined as people who have 
>> been *voted* into a position of authority within official OSGeo 
>> projects and committees, where the voting community includes at least 
>> 3 OSGeo charter members.
>>
>> Acceptable roles are currently limited to:
>> * Project Steering Committee member of a Graduated OSGeo Project
>> * Chair of Official Local Chapter
>> * Chair of an OSGeo committee
>>
>> The application process for recognised OSGeo Community Leaders is the 
>> same as for other nominees.
>>
>> Full text of our processes are at:
>> * http://wiki.osgeo.org/wiki/Membership_Process_2014
>> * http://wiki.osgeo.org/wiki/Election_2014
>>
>> -- 
>> Cameron Shorter,
>> Software and Data Solutions Manager
>> LISAsoft
>> Suite 112, Jones Bay Wharf,
>> 26 - 32 Pirrama Rd, Pyrmont NSW 2009
>>
>> P +61 2 9009 5000,  Wwww.lisasoft.com,  F +61 2 9009 5099
>
> -- 
> Cameron Shorter,
> Software and Data Solutions Manager
> LISAsoft
> Suite 112, Jones Bay Wharf,
> 26 - 32 Pirrama Rd, Pyrmont NSW 2009
>
> P +61 2 9009 5000,  Wwww.lisasoft.com,  F +61 2 9009 5099

-- 
Cameron Shorter,
Software and Data Solutions Manager
LISAsoft
Suite 112, Jones Bay Wharf,
26 - 32 Pirrama Rd, Pyrmont NSW 2009

P +61 2 9009 5000,  W www.lisasoft.com,  F +61 2 9009 5099

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.osgeo.org/pipermail/board/attachments/20140630/87a6cd5c/attachment.htm>