[Board] [OSGeo-Conf] FOSS4G Boston Travel Grants ~ IMPORTANT request

[Steven Feldman]

I fully support Michael’s request. 

It is time for OSGeo to establish a transparent policy on travel grants, to fund them and most importantly to administer them
______
Steven


> On 3 May 2017, at 13:56, Till Adams <till.adams at fossgis.de> wrote:
> 
> As you all can see we've been very busy assembling our program (225 accepted talks <http://2017.foss4g.org/accepted-presentations/>, out of 423 submitted) and rounding out the sponsorship for the conference (>$200k of commitments <http://2017.foss4g.org/sponsor/>). And now, with 2 weeks to go before the Early Bird expires, registration is starting to pickup with ~200 registrations processed.
> 
> And, with registration on people's minds we have started to get the inevitable requests for financial support (e.g., and accepted speaker who's company cannot pay; graduate students looking for support; etc.) and we expect those requests to continue. The Boston LOC (BLOC) would dearly like to have a "Travel Grant Program", but as was pointed out in earlier threads (I believe by both Steven Feldman and Jody Garnett) it is difficult for the host LOC to run such a program. For instance:
> We do not yet know our financial condition. With registrations being notoriously late, we won't know if/how much $'s are available for such a program for some time.
> Administering such a program takes time, and our primary focus is on producing the conference and the workshops.
> Decisions on criteria for choosing recipients and the amount of individual grants can be delicate and the criteria/objectives may differ between the BLOC and OSGeo
> As such, the BLOC would like to make a formal request that OSGeo establish and administer a travel grant program for the Boston 2017 event. We would gladly collaborate and help advertise the program (e.g., on our website and through referrals), but we would concur that this program should be established and funded by OSGeo. We have high hopes that the proceeds from Boston will reimburse OSGeo's investment in subsidizing attendance from certain communities. And, we too will be looking to offer other opportunities for financial support through our volunteer program, and potentially a "need-based" registration discount (if our Early Bird registrations give us increased confidence in our financial success).
> 
> Thank you in advance for considering this request. Please let us know if you have any questions.
> 
> Sincerely, MT & the BLOC
> -- 
> Michael Terner
> Executive Vice President​ & Chair FOSS4G Boston 2017​
> Applied Geographics, Inc.
> 
> 
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