Board Meeting 2021-04-26

This board meeting is scheduled Monday 26 April 2021 at 15:00 UTC through Jitsi, a record of motions is preserved on loomio and actions on osgeo todo issue tracker.
== Agenda ==
=== Current items ===
# roll call
#* appoint meeting chair, meeting scribe/secretary
# Review and approve past minutes
#* Board_Meeting_2021-03-29
# Update on FOSS4G 2021
# Response from SAGANA about letter for sponsorship
# Sponsors (ending soon: Mundialis, not renewed for this year: aon)
# Free Software Foundation - should OSGeo make a response?
# Rajat Shinde <rajatshinde2303 at gmail.com> Google Summer of Code discussion
# add your topic here
== Minutes ==
* Presiding: Till
* Scribing: Till, Codrina
* Attending: Angelos, Astrid, Mike, Michele, Codrina, Helena, Vicky, Till. 
* Guests: Rajat Shinde (Google Summer of Code), Maria Arias (FOSS4G2021) and Regina Obe (SAC)
=== Google Summer of Code organization payment discussion ===
* participation on behalf of GSoC: Rajat Shinde - chair of GSoC
* There is a need of incentives for the mentors to join GSoC, as there is a lack of interest now. 
* There must be 2 mentors (main and secondary) for each project. This year, there were 22 proposals received, out of which they must select 10, as there are only 20 mentors. 
* Question: What can OSGeo do for the mentors? Until now, Google payment goes to OSGeo. What should OSGeo do? Proposals: pass money from OSGeo directly to mentor, free pass to FOSS4G
(Maria offers "We can offer discounts at least for them"), pass the money to the projects and they decide. 
* ACTION: Rajat prepares email with opportunities and requests board for decision/recommendation.
=== Update on FOSS4G 2021 (Maria from BALOC) ===
* Giving up venue (to make online FOSS4G2021) negotiating was closed with payment of 1/4 of the
payment (~15k $).
* Interest is good, normal no. of proposals for talks/workshops;
* Few tickets sold (normal each year);
* Passport info is needed when buying a ticket now in order to justify money movement to authorities. Maria tries to
check and change this. 
* The BALOC needs more help, as some of the team members are either infected with SARs-COV-2 or are taking care of an ill person. 
* The sponsorships are at a safe level, it may even allow to give more discounts to tickets. 
* There are discussions going with streaming providers to make sure that anyone from everywhere can participate;
* There were some sponsors requesting participants' data - it has been completely denied. 
* ACTION: Till to push in the ConfComm to deny sharing participants data to sponsors for future conferences. 
* No action from the board needed. 
=== Review and approve past minutes ===
====Board_Meeting_2021-03-29====
* Motion on Loomio: https://www.loomio.org/d/CTMu0vRQ/approve-meeting-minutes-from-board-meeting-2021-03-29
* Motion status: 
=== Response from SAGANA about letter for sponsorship ===
* Vicky talks about her ideas for getting more sponsors, i.e. having paid people to do that. 
* AE is interested to work on the topic. 
=== Sponsors ===
* ending soon: mundialis
* ACTION: Till to contact mundialis so that they write a mail to OSGeo about what they are doing - sponsoring FOSS4G 2021 - so extending as OSGeo sponsor. 
* not renewed for this year - aon (Mike): aon has renewed for this year;
=== Free Software Foundation - vote passed to appoint Richard Stallman to a board seat ===
* https://www.fsf.org/news/statement-of-fsf-board-on-election-of-richard-stallman
* Should OSGeo make a statement regarding this matter? 
* Michele proposes to give a response from the OSGeo side (https://thenewstack.io/why-almost-everyone-wants-richard-stallman-cancelled/)
* ACTION: Michele drafts statement on Google Drive and shares it with the board for comments. 
=== LDAP/WIKI accounts movement ===
* Regina from SAC participated.
* problems with merging old WIKI accounts to new LDAP for people with "_" in their username;
* maybe more people have problems with merging their accounts due to other unidentified issues;
* email to OSGeo general that explains the possible problems (Regina);
* Astrid asks all board members to write write a mission for themselves, as it is possible now - and sets a good example. 
== IRC Log ==
* meeting was held on Jitsi
Category:Board
Category:Board Meetings 2021