Foundation Board Minutes for Tuesday, April 17th 2018, 18:00 UTC

Next meeting date Tuesday, April 24th 2018, 18:00 UTC

Attending

• AlexandreFranke

• CosimoCecchi

• MegFord

• AllanDay

• NuritziSanchez

• NeilMcGovern

• RosannaYuen

Regrets

• DidierRoche

• CarlosSoriano

Missing

Agenda

• GIMP reimbursements (Allan)
• Conference policy questions (Nuritzi)
• Private engagement list (Nuritzi)
• Events code of conduct, proposal for referendum (Allan)
• Role of the Executive Director and Director of Operations with regards to the Board (Allan)

• Review open issues - https://gitlab.gnome.org/Community/Board/issues (standing agenda item)

Tentative:

• Engagement budget increase (Nuritzi)

  • https://gitlab.gnome.org/Community/Board/issues/42

Next week:

• Travel comittee sync up feedback (Didier)

Minutes

• GIMP reimbursements (Allan)
  • We received a request for some reimbursements from the GIMP team, which we've approved:
    • Travel expenses to LGM 2017.
    • Promotional sticker printing.
    • Accommodation costs for LGM 2018.
• Conference policy questions (Nuritzi)
  • We've had some questions from the GNOME.Asia team about the conference sponsorship policy.
  • If they don't raise enough in sponsorship from one year, will they be penalised in future years? What about if they can't provide accounts?
    • Neil - overspend shouldn't occur. The policy specifies that teams should only spend up to the amount they've raised. If something went wrong on a one-off basis, that shouldn't affect future events.
    • Neil - provision of accounts should be taken into account when approving future event proposals.
  • Another question from GNOME.Asia - what happens if a float isn't returned?
    • Allan - it would be an extreme case if a team isn't able to raise sponsorship to cover the cost of the venue.
  • ACTION: Nuritzi to feed this information back to the GNOME.Asia team. If there are any other questions, Nuritzi to mail Neil and Rosanna and CC the board.
• Private engagement list (Nuritzi)
  • There's a private engagement mailing list. The engagement team wants to know if the board has a vision for this.
  • It's previously been used for press contacts and for embarged announcements.
  • Cosimo - would like to see as much activity as possible of the Engagement team done in public, but if there are private conversations that the Engagement team wants to have, we still need the press private channel. Not sure those are the same people that would participate in both; so probably need a separate list for either kind of discussions.
  • Allan - it's important for there to be a private channel that press contacts can reach out to.
  • ACTION: Nuritzi to go back to the engagement team with this.
• Events code of conduct, proposal for referendum (Allan)
  • The GUADEC 2019 call for bids is waiting for the events code of conduct.
  • Neil - has done some research into the issues raised by Alexandre, but needs a little more time. We can aim for a vote for next week.
  • Alexandre - what's the plan for adopting the code of conduct?
    • Neil - the board can adopt the policy if it wants, but he suggests also having a community vote on it.
    • Cosimo - what would happen if the community rejects the vote?
    • Related - we've had a proposal from Benjamin Berg on foundation-list, which is to invite competing proposals and have a membership vote on them.
    • Cosimo - in line with the bylaws, Ben is free to pursue a referendum, which would require support from 10% of the membership. However, we shouldn't wait on this process before deciding on the existing code of conduct proposal, and we can move forward with putting this to a membership vote.
    • Meg - we should have the community vote to ratify the code of conduct. This should happen at GUADEC, to ensure greater engagement.
      • Cosimo - this would punt the vote to the next board. We ought to be the ones to initiate it. Neil - the future board can just change their mind. Alexandre - doesn't think this would be an issue. We'd be the ones who would have to announce and organise it.
  • Summary: Ben's proposal to be treated as separate from the existing events code of conduct proposal. The board will move forward with a community engagement/consultation of their own.
  • Alexandre - can people vote remotely at an in-person meeting at GUADEC? According to the bylaws that could be possible - those who aren't there could post ballots beforehand.
  • Meg - if a vote happens before the AGM then discussion would only need to happen if the community has concerns about the CoC. If it happens after then the community could discuss during the AGM. Not sure if the Board wants to have a discussion if the community has already agreed to the CoC. Cosimo - that discussion could happen either way.
  • Nuritzi - the code of conduct committee charter needs to be resolved. Alexandre had questions about the separation of powers.
  • ACTION: Allan/Nuritzi to mail round a proposal for the committee charter. Neil to do more data sharing/privacy research.
  • ACTION: Cosimo to respond to Ben on foundation-list, along with some notes on how to proceed with a referendum.