[Board] Board task: finalize liability agreement with FOSS4G 2016 committee

[Jeff McKenna]

Hi Venka,

Thank you for sharing your thoughts.

Regarding the 100,000EUR amount, Till has done some thorough budget 
projections (see the spreadsheet at 
https://svn.osgeo.org/osgeo/foss4g/2016/financial_stuff/osgeo-conference-budget-08_2015.ods), 
including numbers for attendees of 685, 800, and 1000.  At the bottom of 
the "Budget" sheet you will see a section on "Risk Analysis", which 
lists costs associated with cancelling the event by the number of months 
before the event.

This is great that Till has done this, and helped along by the OSGeo 
Conference Committee.

For the 100k EUR liability, this does include the 50k EUR already sent 
to the Bonn committee as an advance payment, so we must now approve the 
other 50k EUR (just in case of something like a full event cancellation).

Regarding the currency listed in the agreement, each year the currency 
is in the venue's currency, to make it easier on them.  I would like to 
keep the currency as EUR in the agreement.

-jeff



On 2015-10-08 9:59 AM, Venkatesh Raghavan wrote:
> Hi Jeff,
>
> As you have guessed, joining today's meeting at the
> time below is not doable for me.
>
> I agree to Maxi about framing of some rules for
> advancing the money. Budget matters are a responsibility
> of the board and Conference Committee need to be
> involved nor should have any say regarding advancing
> money to LoC. Also, sorry, I do not recall if there was
> any reason assigned in increasing the amount from
> 50,000USD (as in case of FOSS4G-Seoul) to 100,000Euro
> in case of FOSS4G-2016.
>
> Also, since the OSGeo Foundation operates from USA, all
> figures could be in USD. There is sizable difference between
> 100,000Euro and 100,000USD.
>
> Best
>
> Venka
>
>
> On 2015/10/08 21:26, Jeff McKenna wrote:
>> I will delay the start of the vote, until today's possible meeting
>> timeslot.  So please, speak up if you have any questions regarding the
>> 2016 agreement; otherwise we will start the vote later today.
>>
>> Thanks!
>>
>> -jeff
>>
>>
>>
>> On 2015-10-08 9:20 AM, Jeff McKenna wrote:
>>> Hi Board,
>>>
>>> Here we are at Thursday now, and as suggested earlier, the plan is to
>>> start the vote today regarding financially supporting the FOSS4G 2016
>>> Bonn event, specifically to approve the signing the proposed agreement
>>> with the Bonn local committee[1].  As I mentioned, since we are already
>>> meeting as a Board next Thursday, today I am willing to meet with anyone
>>> who has concerns with the agreement.  Please note that this vote is
>>> about the 2016 agreement only, and that any further details of the Board
>>> developing "rules" is not affecting or delaying this vote today.
>>>
>>> If you do have questions of the proposed 2016 agreement, please send
>>> them here to the Board or you can also meet today at the suggested
>>> timeslot[2].  We can meet in IRC, and if someone wants to talk we can
>>> then move to a hangout.
>>>
>>> Thanks everyone,
>>>
>>> [1]
>>> https://svn.osgeo.org/osgeo/foss4g/2016/financial_stuff/agreement_with_osgeo/Agreement-between-OSGeo-and-FOSSGISeV-2016.pdf
>>>
>>>
>>> [2]
>>> http://www.timeanddate.com/worldclock/fixedtime.html?year=2015&month=10&day=8&hour=18&min=0&sec=0%2015.00UTC
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> -jeff
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> On 2015-10-05 2:24 PM, Jeff McKenna wrote:
>>>> Hello Board members,
>>>>
>>>> This will be the first public task of the new Board, and may be the
>>>> most
>>>> important one we deal with all year.  And yes, it is extremely time
>>>> sensitive.
>>>>
>>>> Some background (instead of pointing to 5 different threads spanning as
>>>> many different mailing lists):
>>>>
>>>> The FOSS4G Bonn local committee needs OSGeo to financially guarantee
>>>> the
>>>> event.  The OSGeo Conference Committee worked very hard on producing an
>>>> agreement, that passed many keen experienced eyes, both on the OSGeo
>>>> side as well as on the Bonn committee side. This agreement was approved
>>>> by the entire OSGeo Conference Committee and the Bonn local committee,
>>>> and 8 of the 9 OSGeo Board members.  One OSGeo Board member voted -1.
>>>> The original agreement exists at:
>>>> https://svn.osgeo.org/osgeo/foss4g/2016/financial_stuff/agreement_with_osgeo/Agreement-between-OSGeo-and-FOSSGISeV-2016.pdf
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> As for past FOSS4G agreements, Seoul was the first time that the OSGeo
>>>> Board had a direct signed agreement with the local committee, between
>>>> Sanghee and myself, agreeing on such details as profit sharing; for all
>>>> of the other FOSS4G events, those details were handled in the agreement
>>>> between the professional conference organizing company (PCO). Steven
>>>> Feldman compiled some details from some of the recent FOSS4G events, in
>>>> a Google spreadsheet (I just sent each board member an invite to that
>>>> document).
>>>>
>>>> At the time that this 2016 agreement was being initially proposed, it
>>>> was before FOSS4G Seoul, and it was honestly a little tricky to be
>>>> signing such a commitment before we knew the outcome of the FOSS4G
>>>> Seoul
>>>> event (like any event, we could have lost money).  But now, I feel
>>>> everything is more clear for the Board: FOSS4G Seoul was successful,
>>>> the
>>>> break-even point was 400 attendees, and we went over that to roughly
>>>> 560
>>>> attendees.  So OSGeo doesn't have to worry about that, and now we can
>>>> financially guarantee the 2016 Bonn event, for 100,000 euros, as was
>>>> originally proposed.
>>>>
>>>> I want to make sure that each Board member supports this, and I will
>>>> personally do my best to meet privately with whoever has questions.
>>>>
>>>> Maxi, now that we are through FOSS4G Seoul, do you yourself have any
>>>> concerns not handled now?  If you do (or any Board member) I suggest
>>>> that we meet through Google Hangout on this Thursday. Possible time:
>>>> http://www.timeanddate.com/worldclock/fixedtime.html?year=2015&month=10&day=8&hour=18&min=0&sec=0%2015.00UTC
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>   (sorry Venka/Sanghee that time is not do-able for you, but you can
>>>> voice your opinions here or to me privately, sorry about this one
>>>> meeting time)
>>>>
>>>> I'm getting many direct emails on how this is important for the 2016
>>>> committee.  We OSGeo must get this agreement passed.  It is on next
>>>> week's Board agenda, but I hope we can solve this this week. It will be
>>>> a team effort.
>>>>
>>>> Thanks all,
>>>>
>>>> -jeff
>>>>
>>>>