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Board/Minutes/2026-05-14

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Board chat - not open to observers.

Draft minutes.

Thursday 14 May 2026 at 13:00 UTC.

Video room at https://osmvideo.cloud68.co
using BigBlueButton.

Acronyms

Participants

  • Craig Allan
  • Héctor Ochoa Ortiz
  • Maurizio Napolitano (Napo)
  • Laura Mugeha
  • Brazil Singh

Not Present

  • Dani Waltersdorfer
  • Roland Olbricht

Officers and Board Historic
Board member biographies Historic
Background sections and minutes by Dorothea Kazazi.

Guests

Meeting not open to observers.

Meeting with the US Department of Transportation (USDOT)

Dani was absent.

Dani to schedule a meeting with a representative of the US Department of Transportation (USDOT). Craig has filled the scheduling poll.

SotM2026 logistics

Dani was absent.

On board accommodation
The State of the Map organising committee (SotM WG) has booked 70 rooms at a hotel near the State of the Map 2026 conference venue, for the OSM community. They plan to put the information on the SotM website.

Suggestion: Board members to notify Dani whether they will attend the international State of the Map 2026 conference , so that she can book the hotel rooms for the board.

Resources: uMap by Benoit

2026 face-to-face board meeting facilitation

Dani was absent.

Gunner (Allen Gunn, face-to-face board meeting facilitator) asked the Chairperson and Secretary to circulate his email to the rest of the board. Gunner can have one-on-one talks with a board members before the meeting, if they wish so, but it is optional.

Proposed OSM course at Geoversity

Topic proposed by Héctor. Internal board GitLab ticket #1035.

Proposal: The board to create a new, free OSM online course, to raise awareness about OSM and OSMF, and host it on Geoversity.

Background: The ITC faculty of the University of Twente (NL) focuses on geoinformation and it is well known in the Netherlands. It has a project funded by the Dutch ministry of Foreign Affairs to create online courses on geoinformation, which could be free (where people pay for the certificate) or paid, and they are interested in hosting courses from outside the University. At the Geospatial World Forum, Héctor met a representative from the University of Twente (NL) and they proposed the creation of an OSM online course, to be hosted at Geoversity.

Héctor will be in the Netherlands next month for a week and is happy to record the course then.

Suggestions on content

  • Provide new material, as there are already OSM courses provided, mostly focused on the humanitarian side.
  • Explain what OSMF is and how it differs from other OSM-related organisations.
  • Allow for abstraction. Discuss the nature of community mapping, the nature of digital commons and handling scraping. Avoid focusing on technical details.
  • Present the disputed territory policy. Explain what can be changed on the map, the role of each Working Group, and the role of OSMF, as there is still confusion.
  • The board to structure the content, if the recording will take place in a couple of weeks. Laura offered to help.

Other suggestions

  • The course should be free.
  • Certification: Discuss at the face-to-face board meeting about providing optional (paid) certification, to raise funds.

Points to clarify

  • Complexity of the course.
  • Whether it will be possible to link to other OSM courses (e.g. if you want to know more about this, check this course).
  • Whether it will be possible to post the course later somewhere else.

Other points mentioned during discussion

  • Héctor created a shared folder on Nextcloud for the slides, each lecture and the syllabus.

Participation at the EuroSDR workshop after SotM

Suggestion: The board to present at the EuroSDR workshop after SotM 2026.

Background: EuroSDR is a Europe-wide research organisation focused on geospatial digital infrastructure. In 2024, Héctor attended a EuroSDR workshop on volunteered information, together with national mapping agencies, in Glasgow. EuroSDR proposed a two-day free workshop to be held just after SotM 2026 (Monday and Tuesday) and has extended the deadline of submissions to 2026-06-01.

Other suggestions:

  • Topic: The future of OSM core services in the age of AI boom and scraping and how to keep OSM sustainable.

Next steps:

  • Find board members to volunteer.
  • Vote on cost, as board members' accommodation will need to be covered.
  • Draft an 800-1200 words abstract and submit it before the 1st of June, 2026.

On potential attendance:

  • Craig might attend the workshop, subject to arrangements with his wife.
  • Napo is also interested in attending.

Other points mentioned during discussion

  • Peter Mooney will participate.

Issue with paying the OSMF contractor in Peru

The Treasurer, Roland Olbricht, was absent.

The Bank of Ireland and Fire EU do not process payments to Peru. This is an urgent topic, as it reflects poorly on the organisation.

Suggestions

  • Check whether the Triodos Bank can make the payment, even if it has high fees.
  • OSMF to open a Wise account - they have good rates.

On opening a Wise account

  • Several people have recommended Wise to Craig.
  • OSMF previously had a Wise account, but Wise suspended it because of transactions from members in Afghanistan.
  • We could close the account after the payment is made.

Action item

Craig to ask Roland to create a Wise OSMF account and cc the board on the email.

Catalan countries - Local Chapter application

Suggestion by Roland: Consult the Spanish OSM community before voting on the Catalan countries' Local Chapter application.

Background: The Local Chapters and Communities Working Group (LCCWG) has consulted the Italian and French Local Chapters. The comments were positive. The LCCWG did not consult OSM Spain, because it is not an official OSM Local Chapter (LC) yet - its Local Chapter application is here.

Héctor declared a conflict of interest, as he is on the board of OSM Spain.

  • The Catalan OSM community is more active than the Spanish one, and most of its tagging conventions end up on the map.
  • The Oceanian OSM Local Chapter is a different case from this one.
  • Some similarity to the formation of the Kosovo OSM Local Chapter.

On language

  • Spanish and Catalan are distinct enough that they are considered different languages, with a similarity of 85-90 %.
  • There are different Catalan dialects.
  • In Valencia, people refer to their dialect as Valencian, even though it's a dialect of Catalan.
  • Communities are formed more around language rather than region.
  • In Catalonia:
    • schools: Catalan is taught as the first language and Spanish as the second one.
    • TV: everything is dubbed into Catalan.
    • street signs: in Catalan, occasionally also in Spanish.
    • in rural areas, some people might disapprove of others speaking Spanish.

Other suggestions

  • Create a guideline on languages and the formation of Local Chapters.
  • Consider approving thematic OSM chapters.
    • The LCCWG is developing an affiliation model, where groups less formal than Local Chapters may be included.
  • Hold a vote on the Catalan countries' local chapter application during the public board meeting.
    • We will approve the resolution proposed by the LCCWG.

Other points mentioned during discussion

  • Wikimedia Foundation: the Catalan group is one of the only two organizations that exists that are not chapters. It has a very strong core.
  • South Africa has 11 different languages, with the dominant one being English. 3% of the people speak English as their first language.
  • Kenya has 47 different languages, with the dominant one being English. 25% of the people speak English as their first language.

The board chat ended 34 minutes after start.

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