Board/Minutes/2025-04-10

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Participants

  • Craig Allan
  • Dani Waltersdorfer
  • Guillaume Rischard
  • Héctor Ochoa Ortiz
  • Maurizio Napolitano
  • Laura Mugeha
  • Roland Olbricht

Officers and board historic
Biographies historic
Minutes by Dorothea Kazazi.

Not Present

Guests

Meeting not open to observers.

Renewal of the OSMF credit card and how to handle it for the next five years

Topic proposed by Roland.

Almost all payments are made by our accountant, Michelle Heydon, to ensure that the accounts are correct.

The OSMF credit card is used for a certain class of regular payments, and for the hotel used during the face-to-face board meetings, once per year.

Credit card-related issues
Over a five-year period,

  • we'll have the OSMF credit card in custody of a person whose name is not printed on the credit card.
  • the person whose name is on the card receives the bank codes for two-factor authentication.

Bank of Ireland issue

  • Bank access is restricted to two persons, and one has to be the accountant. Currently, the second one is Guillaume (former Treasurer), instead of Roland (current Treasurer).

OWG expenses issue

  • Grant has raised the issue that he is buying OSMF computer equipment with his personal money and then gets reimbursed.

Questions
- Should the OSMF credit card get renewed?
- Should we use the OSMF credit card only in emergency cases?

Suggestions

  • Bank of Ireland: Roland (Treasurer) to get access to the bank, replacing Guillaume.
  • Credit card: Reduce usage.
  • OWG expenses: Issue Grant with,
    • an OSMF credit card with a limit, e.g. EUR 500, which we'll top up. Would this technically work, regarding authentication?
    • a debit card connected to an OSMF bank account with an allocated amount of money.
  • Provide Grant a bank card associated with a bank account with a limit.w
  • Give Grant access to an OSMF cc. Potential issue: authentication.

Other points mentioned during discussion

  • The issue will go away when we move to Belgium.
  • Some board members have talked before about having multiple OSMF credit cards, but it is probably more expensive.
  • Roland is considering rerunning in the 2025 board elections.

Setting the 2025 Annual General Meeting date

Topic proposed by Dorothea and approved by Héctor.

Related to circular 2025/11.

Dorothea has proposed to the board since January 2025 a potential date for the 2025 Annual General Meeting (AGM) and created the related election timeline. While the information has been on the board GitLab repository, there was no official discussion about this topic. Dani created a board circular, but it did not pass.

On holding the AGM during SotM 2025 in Manila (3-5 October 2025)

  • Publicity for the board.
  • Publicity for the board candidates, provide them the opportunity to explain why they're running and give them in-person exposure with the community.
  • SotM will be used as a platform.
  • Would mean a heavy October and November for budget discussions.
  • Too late in the year - new board members require some time to get familiar with how things work.

On the 2026 budget

  • Suggestion: Start now work on the 2026 budget.
  • The 2026 budget will be similar to the 2025 one.
  • The 2026 budget does not need to be done wholly by the new board.
  • It's sometimes standard in non-profits to have a budget approved at the AGM.

Suggestions

  • Hold the AGM in early September.
  • Ask the osmf-talk mailing list.

Other points mentioned during discussion

  • Preference to not hold the AGM during the last part of the year, to give new bard members the chance to participate in the preparation of the OSMF budget. So, after SotM 2025 it will be too late.
  • New board members cannot be expected to do a budget in their first year.

Guillaume joined.

Roland rejoined

On CiviCRM issues

On CiviCRM

  • Used to handle the OSMF membership database.
  • Integrated with fundraising, so that people can opt-in to hear from us, or to round-up their membership payment.
  • There are many organisations using CiviCRM and having recurring membership.
  • What makes CiviCRM complicated is i) that we have to interleave it with our membership scheme of associated memberships, and ii) the integration with fundraising, as it increases the complexity.
  • We recently stopped the automatic membership renewals. We would like to automate again things for future AGMs.
  • Craig has asked the OWG for a local CiviCRM copy.

Concerns

  • We are running an obsolete version of CiviCRM.
  • Noone is making sure that CiviCRM updates are workimg.
  • We haven't contracted a CiviCRM consulrant.

On CiviCRM and the 2025 AGM

  • If CiviCRM is running, we can have the AGM early, otherwise we have to set it as late as possible.
  • It is unclear if our most recent CiviCRM consultant can work on this issue.

On the OSMF members' list

  • The 2024 AGM objections from members about the correctness of the membership list had been tied to the special membership classes and the overlap.
  • We need to produce sufficiently early in time a definite list of members who have voting rights for the 2025 board election.
  • People renew memberships even in the days before voting starts, so the election list can only be finalised on the date that voting starts.
  • Michael Spreng (MWG volunteer) was manually validating OSMF memberships.
  • Validating memberhips by hand is pretty ok and this is what Michael Spreng (MWG) has suggested doing. However, as recurring memberships were a problem, we have stopped their auto-renewal.

Suggestions

  • Reduce the complexity of CiviCRM as mush as possible. We could restrict it to list of names, email addresses, OSM usernames and notices of payments.
  • Start work on the budget now, so not all work needs to be done by the next board.

Action items

  • The board to make sure CiviCRM is working.
  • Craig to ask the MWG (Michael Spreng) if they are confident they can produce a suitable list of voters for the AGM.
  • Dorothea to ask Grant to create a test version of CiviCRM.
  • Board to review Dorothea's election timeline on the board GitLab.
  • Board to decide on the AGM date, after MWG's feedback.

Links shared:

Bing problems and JOSM

Topic proposed by Laura.

Related to JOSM ticket #23913 and discussion on community.osm.org.

Bing imagery issues experienced since January 2025. Community forum comments suggest the problem is related to API usage. Mikel Maron (Advisory Board coordinator) has reached-out to Microsoft.

Suggestions

  • Contact Microsoft.
  • Inform the community.
  • Push for alternative of image sources.

Action items

  • Craig to get an update from Mikel.
  • Laura to work with Mikel in contacting people at Microsoft.
  • Laura to talk with JOSM people.

Some points have not been minuted.

Potentially endorsing the UN Open Source Principles

Topic proposed by Laura.

Related to https://unite.un.org/news/fifteen-organizations-endorse-un-open-source-principles


The proposal to endorse the UN Open Source Principles came from the Open Source Initiative (OSI). OSMF is an OSI affiliate member. OSI was the first organisation to endorse the UN Open Source Principles.

On potential benefits

  • Placing OSMF in critical conversations around open source.
  • Networking.

On potential drawbacks

  • No conflict or disadvantage visible.
  • Point 4 is about diversity and inclusion, which is problematic with the current US administration.
    • While we agree with that point, we might be taking sides on something that goes beyond maps.
    • OSM tries to increase diversity and be inclusive.
    • We want to provide sources to communities everywhere.
    • The current board has people of different colour and genders.

Suggestions

  • The board to carefully check whether there are some indirect politics.
  • The board to create a circular and vote on endorsing the UN Open Source Principles.

Other points mentioned during discussion

  • Supporting such initiatives is a good idea.
  • Supporting such initiatives is a good idea.
  • We shouldn't just be doing things because we're going to get benefits, but because we believe in them.
  • We typically don't want to get into politics.
  • We have received substantial support from American agencies and companies.

Dani had to disconnect 40 minutes after start.s

Sovereign Tech Fund update

Topic proposed by Héctor.

The OSMF has a new contractor for OSM core software development facilitation (Old blog post announcing that applications were open).

Mihn Nguyễn, the new Core Software Development Facilitator, signed the contract and started work this week. We had a meeting with him and Sarah Hoffmann (Personnel Committee) and there will be a second meeting within the first two weeks.

Other points mentioned during discussion

  • The Communications Working Group will work with Minh on an announcement
  • Minh's job involves communication, so a good relationship with CWG would be an important part of that job.
  • We have to spend around 16,000 per month from now on.

Héctor was thanked for his work.

Corporate Membership - LINE Yahoo Corporation (Japan)

Topic proposed by Dorothea and approved by Craig.

Board review and vote needed on approval of external letter of consent for use of LY Corporation trademarks.

Line Yahoo Corporation in Japan is interested in becoming a Corporate Member. They asked the board to approve a document regarding use of their trademarks, for the display of their logo on the OSMF website. It was noted the document is 30 pages of dense legal text.

Suggestions

  • Ask for the LWG's feedback.

Action item: Dorothea to ask the LWG to review the LINE Yahoo Corporation (Japan) agreement.

Speakers for board meeting

Topic proposed by Craig.

We had a successful list of speakers for board meetings last year, organised by Arnalie Vicario (former board member and current LCCWG member). This month there will be a presentation by FPOSM.

Suggestions

  • Ask Arnalie to continue arranging the community presentations during board meetings.
  • The board to continue including community presentations during the monthly board meetings and find a way to arrange them.

Other points mentioned during discussion

  • Community presentations do not have to take place every month.
  • Some presentations were repetitive or long.
  • Unclear what the process should be for recruiting speakers.
  • Community presentations are important and we should arrange them.

Strategic planning

Topic proposed by Craig.

Craig asked for volunteers to work on Strategic Planning - Héctor and Laura volunteered to work with Craig.

Allan Mustard (former Chairperson and current chair of the Moderation team) has offered to help with the technical side of running the survey software.

On most recent strategic planning

  • Done two years ago.
  • It included a big community survey and that gave it legitimacy.

Suggestions

  • Run a similar community survey as last time.
  • Craig to contact Allan Mustard and Sarah Hoffmann (former board member and currently on the Personnel Committee) to see if they are interested. Sarah had been involved in the previous strategic planning as a board member.

Other points mentioned during discussion

  • The most recent strategic planning included a big community survey, and that gave it legitimacy.
  • The survey software is expensive, so we should use it.

Internship enquiries

Topic proposed by Dorothea and approved by Héctor.

The board received 5 internship requests, all from the same university

Suggestions

  • Send one response to all of them, explaining that we don't offer internships, but there are volunteer opportunities. Emphasize that we don't provide certificates about volunteer work.

Action item: Craig to put draft reply on GitLab and ask the Secretary to review it.

2025 board face-to-face meeting logistics

Topic proposed by Dorothea and approved by Héctor.

  • Enquiries to OpenDot Lab
  • Signing Visa invitation letters
  • Travel applications (Travel policy here)

Maurizio offered to help by signing the invitation letters of board members who need to apply for Visa. He also relayed that the OpenDot Lab agreed to receive the deliveries of the materials needed for the meeting.

On car travel Maurizio will travel by car and asked whether the expenses will be covered. It was mentioned that OSMF has covered Grant Slater's (SSRE) car travel for OWG purposes at the UK legal rate.

Action item: Roland to create a circular by Sunday for approval of covering flight bookings, visa reimbursements, and airport transfers. Dorothea to send a reminder to Roland, if needed.

Any other business

SotM 2025 related

Board participation

Decision: Submit an OSMF board "Ask Me Anything" session as was done last year in Nairobi.

Action item: Laura to submit an OSMF board "Ask Me Anything" session.

SotM WG

The SotMs-WG has officially Dorothea's time for support.

  • This is included in the SotM-WG's budget.

Suggestions

  • Make it clear to the SotM-WG that they are entitled to the hours of Dorothea they have included in the budget and there is no reason to ask.

Other points mentioned during discussion

  • Dorothea's ability to help the SotM-WG depends on when the board sets the AGM, as she's running the board election.

Spreadsheets tracking OSMF expenses

'Harrison's spreadsheet

  • Has not been updated yet.

'Craig's spreadsheet'

  • It was created in order to be easily updated each month, by cutting and pasting from one of the cash flow reports in Xero.
  • All line items on Xero are included in the spreadsheet.
  • There are some line items which are not on Xero.
  • It includes the bank credits, so we can't publish it.
  • Roland needs to review it.

Other point mentioned during discussion

  • New board members have Xero access.

Chat ended ~ 62 minutes after start.

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