[LGM] Request For Comments - reorganizing financial tasks for LGM

[Femke Snelting]

Thank you for your precise proposal Nate, apologies for almost missing the 20 May deadline for comments:

> A. Should we try to make a change in the way LGM currently fiscally
> operates?

Yes.

After 11 years of LGM (!!) I think it is time to think ahead and develop a more sustainable way to do fundraising, reimbursement and financial planning for the meetings to come. This is relatively urgent with Brazil 2017 coming up, but it is also an occasion to gain transparency and stability as a project that is apparently here to stay.

Louis has been taking on the responsibility for finances from the beginning (2006). Out of principle and care for the longevity of LGM, I think we need to share the responsibility. It would be better if there was more than one person with access to the LGM account and subsequently more than one person with detailed insight in our finances. Working with an umbrella organisation seems a constructive way to evolve out of this situation.

I think that the proposed change in the way LGM currently operates will increase transparency and stability. This will have positive effects on the way we can internally organise, and on our relations to the world around it. It will hopefully allow us to do better planning (including eventually changing the way reimbursements work) and fundraising (developing long term strategies for fundraising). It will not take away the labor, but it will potentially make the labor more effective, and easier to distribute.

> B. If so, what umbrella organization should we work with?
> (current proposal: Software in the Public Interest)

We have not yet found a non-US based umbrella organisation, which I think could be useful for LGM. Otherwise, I am fine with SPI or Software Conservancy, though I would like to hear back from them first in response to our questions first, before making that decision.

> C. What specific conditions should be met by the umbrella organization?
> (see: https://etherpad.openstack.org/p/LGM_Funding_Notes)

My main concern is whether there would be individual or regional blacklists that might make reimbursements for certain participants harder or impossible.



Femke