<div>Folks,</div><div><br></div><div>One of my aspirations as president has been to describe the actions </div><div>of the board to the broader community after each board meeting. </div><div>I haven't been doing to well so far, but I shall try to do so now. </div>
<div><br></div><div>We had a board meeting (by IRC) today. The agenda, minutes, etc </div><div>appear in the wiki (Cameron may not yet have added the minutes): </div><div><br></div><div> <a href="http://wiki.osgeo.org/wiki/Board_Meeting_2012-11-22">http://wiki.osgeo.org/wiki/Board_Meeting_2012-11-22</a></div>
<div><br></div><div>Major items from the meeting:</div><div><br></div><div>1) We approved a memorandum of understanding (MOU) with the</div><div>Geomatics Laboratory of Como Campus of Politecnico di Milano</div><div>(Italy). In the last couple of years we have made great progress</div>
<div>establishing or linking with open source geospatial labs at a</div><div>variety of educational institutions. This effort has been lead by</div><div>Suchith Anand from the University of Nottingham. </div><div><br></div>
<div> <a href="http://wiki.osgeo.org/wiki/MOU_Politecnico_di_Milano">http://wiki.osgeo.org/wiki/MOU_Politecnico_di_Milano</a></div><div><br></div><div>When we establish these relationships we normally appoint</div><div>one or more contacts on behalf of OSGeo to a joint advisory</div>
<div>committee. Anne Ghisla has agreed to look into whether we</div><div>have been doing that properly and who it ought to be in this</div><div>case. </div><div><br></div><div>2) I stepped down as President. I've found I don't have as much </div>
<div>initiative for the role of president as I'd like, and it was my intention </div><div>anyways to bring new blood into the role of President in the not too </div><div>distant future. So I decided to expedite things and Jeff McKenna </div>
<div>has very kindly agreed to take on the role of President with the </div><div>support of the board.</div><div><br></div><div>I'm not going away, and will continue on the board and answering</div><div><a href="mailto:info@osgeo.org">info@osgeo.org</a> questions with Jeff also assisting now. Jeff has</div>
<div>great enthusiasm for OSGeo and is very active around the world</div><div>promoting the open source geospatial community and supporting</div><div>it through efforts including MapServer documentation, MS4W and</div><div>
the Zoo Project. I also count him as a valued friend of many </div><div>years.</div><div><br></div><div>3) Last year the board had a very constructive face to face meeting</div><div>in Seattle and we discussed whether to hold a one this year. We</div>
<div>did not come to a firm conclusion though we are considering a </div><div>meeting alongside FOSS4G-NA this spring. </div><div><br></div><div>4) Daniel Morissette, or Treasurer, has been working very hard</div><div>to regularize our 501(c)3 (charitable) status with the IRS (US tax</div>
<div>service) and provided some brief updates including the response</div><div>document at:</div><div><br></div><div> <a href="http://wiki.osgeo.org/wiki/501c3_Application:_Questions_from_IRS,_September_2012">http://wiki.osgeo.org/wiki/501c3_Application:_Questions_from_IRS,_September_2012</a></div>
<div><br></div><div>5) We also declared the board meeting of 2012-08-20 as our official </div><div>AGM (Annual General Meeting) for purposes of corporate reporting.</div><div>Normally the AGM is where a new board of directors is elected but</div>
<div>since we do that by email our AGM is somewhat nebulous. So we</div><div>declared the board meeting at which those election results came into</div><div>effect as our official AGM for reporting purposes. </div><div><br>
</div><div>Our next board meeting will be held January 17th.</div><div><br></div><div>Best regards,</div><div><br></div>-- <br>---------------------------------------+--------------------------------------<br>I set the clouds in motion - turn up | Frank Warmerdam, <a href="mailto:warmerdam@pobox.com" target="_blank">warmerdam@pobox.com</a><br>
light and sound - activate the windows | <a href="http://pobox.com/~warmerdam" target="_blank">http://pobox.com/~warmerdam</a><br>and watch the world go round - Rush | Geospatial Software Developer<br><br>