Board/Minutes/2025-08

From OpenStreetMap Foundation
< Board‎ | Minutes

This was the last board meeting before the 2025 board election.

Date and time: Thursday 28 August 2025 at 13:30 UTC.
Minutes approved during the 2025-09-25 board meeting.

Location: Video room https://osmvideo.cloud68.co/user/dor-2cd-qah-rim
using BigBlueButton.

Please note that the individual points mentioned below usually reflect the opinion of one or more board members and not necessarily of the whole board. Official board decisions are taken during the meetings or by voting using circulars, and votes are listed in the minutes.

The topics of the agenda get locked one week before the meeting.

Acronyms

Participants

["talk" time*] Director's name

  • [13'] Craig Allan (Chairing)
  • [05'] Héctor Ochoa Ortiz
  • [01'] Maurizio Napolitano
  • [00'] Laura Mugeha
  • [03'] Roland Olbricht

*Includes time when the microphone was activated due to noise.

Absent

  • Dani Waltersdorfer
  • Guillaume Rischard

Officers and Board Historic
Board member biographies Historic
Minutes by Dorothea Kazazi.

Guests

  • 5 guests

Open to all OSM Foundation members. (Become a member of the Foundation, even for free if you are an active OSM contributor)

You are welcome to ask questions or to comment (via voice or on the chat) at the end of the meeting.

  • Please mute your microphone when you join, and to preserve bandwidth, refrain from turning on your webcam.
  • If you are in a low-bandwidth environment, you may benefit from using BigBlueButton's low-bandwidth settings. To assess them, click on the 3 dots on the top right of the black video-window.

Administrative

Approval of previous minutes

Circular Resolutions

2025/Res21 Board approves funds up to 350 Euros for SotM Latam 2025 for Héctor Ochoa Ortiz

Héctor1 will attend SOTM Latin America (2025) in Colombia. He will cover the majority of the costs but the vote agrees on covering funds for his travel costs (lodging, food) up to 350Euros.

Did not pass on 2025-08-25 with,

  • 2 votes in favour: Craig Allan, Daniela Waltersdorfer (Thank you, Hector!).
  • 1 against: Guillaume Rischard (Considering the budget shortfall we have, covering travel costs for conferences seems unwise.)
  • 1 abstained: Héctor Ochoa Ortiz (Abstain, as I am the person involved)
  • 3 did not vote:Laura Mugeha, Maurizio Napolitano, Roland Olbricht.
Circular by Daniela Waltersdorfer.

1 Héctor Ochoa Ortiz, Board member.

Please note that there was a live vote during this September meeting, and the funding was approved.

2025/Res22 Board approves funds up to 350 Euros for SotM Africa 2025 for Laura Mugeha

Laura2 will attend SOTM Latin America3 in Tanzania. She will cover the majority of the costs but the vote agrees on covering funds for her travel costs (lodging, food) up to 350Euros.

Did not pass on 2025-08-25 with,

  • 3 votes in favour: Héctor Ochoa Ortiz, Daniela Waltersdorfer (Thank you, Laura!), Craig Allan (We are very grateful that Laura will represent OSMF at SotM Africa in Tanzania. While we can't fully sponsor the trip we would like to make a contribution.).
  • 1 against: Guillaume Rischard (Considering the budget shortfall we have, covering travel costs for conferences seems unwise.)
  • 3 did not vote: Laura Mugeha, Maurizio Napolitano, Roland Olbricht.
Circular by Daniela Waltersdorfer.

2 Laura Mugeha, Board member.
3 SotM Africa.

Please note that there was a live vote during this September meeting, and the funding was approved.

Chairperson's report

OSMF move to the EU

Some board members had a productive meeting with members of the Licensing Working Group (LWG) on 2025-08-18, regarding the OSMF move to the EU. The main issue was the quality of advice we have been getting from legal firms in England and in Belgium. The resolution of the meeting was to find different lawyers in both England and Belgium that would meet the standards that the LWG would like to see and to move forward in the new year. This will help us to move in a more confident way in the future.

Secretary's report

The summer is almost over in the Northern Hemisphere. I'm not too happy about that, but that's only because I know this means eventually winter will come. But, this also means warmer times are ahead in the Southern Hemisphere! In any case, let's get to our OSM Board update for you.

First and foremost, I'd like to share a big thank you to everyone joining us and making time to be with us. We appreciate it!

OSMF move to the EU - Meeting with the LWG

About two weeks ago, the OSMF Board met with our Legal Working Group (LWG) to receive guidance on our next steps as we continue our push toward the EU. Thank you, LWG, for helping us out and providing such needed support.

Operations - Introductory video-meeting

Our Operations Working Group (OWG) will be hosting an "Intro to OSM Ops" sometime in September (See OSMcal entry - 2025-09-27)). Please stay on the lookout for the official announcement—we’re excited to see more community engagement around this!

Core Software Engineer applications

Furthermore, we want to thank everyone who submitted an application to our Software Engineer opening(blog post). We’re working hard behind the scenes to review all submissions and schedule interviews with selected candidates. We’re truly grateful for your interest and enthusiasm!

2025 General Meeting

A quick but important reminder: our Annual General Meeting (AGM) will be held on September 13, 2025. This is one of the Foundation’s most important meetings, and we’d like to extend a warm invitation to all our community members to join. During the AGM, the Board will announce the newly elected members. Please take time to read through the manifestos and candidate Q&As to learn more about who’s running.

Thank you

Treasurer's report

Fundraising campaign

  • We expect a large deficit, so we have to do a fundraising campaign.
  • Need to prepare the financial report for last year and use the momentum to initiate the fundraising campaign.

Suggestions

  • Coordinate with other Working Groups, such as the Communication Working Group (CWG). For example, have a fundraising banner on osm.org.
  • Each board member to help with fundraising.
    • Héctor has been helping with the application for the FLOSS fund.

Other points mentioned during discussion

  • One of the challenge is to get the buy-in from the members.
  • The larger amount of money comes from data consumers and philanthropic sources, so hesitance to raise money from mappers - but the mappers are our trust base, and it is good to keep them in the loop, to ensure we go in the good direction.
  • A Wikipedia style campaign might not be helpful.
  • We don't want to have one big donor, as they might get undue control over the process.

Update on Core Software Engineer applications

Topic proposed by Dani Waltersdorfer. Related to 2025-08-01 blog post Apply to be the OpenStreetMap Core Software Engineer.

Héctor has been involved with the application process.

Four applicants have been shortlisted and there are another two. This week we will have an interview with one of the candidates and some board members, and the next week another two interviews involving board members. The plan is to select an applicant in the next couple of weeks.

2025 Annual General Meeting reminder

Topic proposed by Dani Waltersdorfer. Related to the 19th Annual General Meeting of the OpenStreetMap Foundation on 13th of September 2025 at 1600 UTC.

The 2025 Annual General Meeting (AGM) will take place on 13 September, in text format. The results of the board election will be announced. This is the last public board meeting before the AGM.

Debrief of LWG-Board meeting about OSMF's move to the EU

Topic proposed by Dani Waltersdorfer.

OSMF received factually wrong advice from the legal counsels we asked around a year ago. When asked whether they are sure about their claims, they turned unavailable.

On LWG feedback
The board received feedback from the LWG that this damage is beyond repair and the behaviour of the legal counsels was not normal behaviour for lawyers. So, we need to restart the process from the UK side.

Covered by the Chairperson's and Secretary's reports.

Any other business

Vote to cover funds for Héctor's travel costs for SotM Latam 2025

Héctor Ochoa Ortiz (board member) will attend SotM Latin America 2025 in Colombia. He will cover the majority of the costs but the vote agrees on covering funds for his travel costs (lodging, food) up to 350Euros.

Approved on 2025-08-28 with,

  • 4 votes in favour: Craig Allan, Laura Mugeha, Maurizio Napolitano, Roland Olbricht.
  • 1 abstained: Héctor Ochoa Ortiz (Abstaining, as I am the person involved)
  • 2 did not vote: Guillaume Rischard (absent), Daniela Waltersdorfer (absent).
Proposed by Craig, seconded by Roland.

Vote to cover funds for Laura's travel costs for SotM Africa 2025

Laura Mugeha (board member) will attend SotM Africa 2025 in Tanzania. She will cover the majority of the costs but the vote agrees on covering funds for her travel costs (lodging, food) up to 350Euros.

Approved on 2025-08-28 with,

  • 4 votes in favour: Craig Allan, Héctor Ochoa Ortiz, Maurizio Napolitano, Roland Olbricht.
  • 1 abstained: Laura Mugeha (Abstaining)
  • 2 did not vote: Guillaume Rischard (absent), Daniela Waltersdorfer (absent).
Proposed by Craig, seconded by Héctor.

Thanks to departing board members

Thanks were expressed to Guillaume who was a board member for 6 years. Other board members who have 6-year+ terms were: Steve Coast, Mikel Maron, Henk Hoff, Frederik Ramm and Paul Norman. Guillaume was immediately elected as Treasurer, and spent two years in that role and also spent two years as Chairperson of the Foundation. Wish for him to stay involved with the Working Groups (WGs).

It was noted that Dani and Roland are likely to get re-elected.

Guest comments or questions

Thanks to departing board members

Thanks were expressed by imagico (guest) to all potentially and actually departing board members for their work during the last two years.

Thanks were expressed by Brazil Singh (guest) to the past board members for their hard work. Brazil added that he hopes that in the next years he will be able to contribute to the board.

Next meetings

Mid-month board chat: 11 September 2025 at 13:30 UTC

Not open to observers. About mid-month board chats.

Dates: See this Framagenda calendar (yellow dots), and the board meetings page.

Open board meeting: 25 September 2025 at 13:30 UTC

This will be the first meeting of the new board, after the 2025 board election. The new recurring day and time of meetings will be set by the Secretary.

2025 dates of open board meetings: on this Framagenda calendar (green dots).

Add future board meetings to your calendar
If you want future board meetings to be automatically added to your calendar, you can subscribe to the following iCalendar link. Instructions on how to do that depend on which calendar software/service you use. The link is provided for your convenience. Please note that:

  • It might not work when Framasoft servers experience problems.
  • You might get delayed updates, depending on how often the calendar service from your side syncs/checks for updates.
  • Both public and non-public meetings are added to this calendar. The later ones have a note in their description about being non-public.

Meeting adjourned 22 minutes after start.

Retrieved from "https://osmfoundation.org/w/index.php?title=Board/Minutes/2025-08&oldid=13986"