Board Election Procedure

This is a preliminary proposal for a board election process, and has not been approved.

= General Process =

Half of the board positions (4 or 5) will be up for election each year in a process operated by the Chief Returning Officer (CRO).

Nominations

 * 1) The nominations period should be roughly 1 week, and should be announced by the CRO on the OSGeo announce and discuss lists.
 * 2) Nominations should for the board positions should be sent to the CRO (at cro@osgeo.org).
 * 3) Nominees must be charter members.
 * 4) The CRO should verify with the nominee that they are willing to stand for the election.  This should include an explanation of board responsibilities and workload.   Once confirmed, the CRO should forward the nomination to the OSGeo discuss list.  No seconder is required.
 * 5) All OSGeo members (members as well as charter members) are encouraged to discuss candidates on the discuss list.
 * 6) The nomination period should be approximately 1 week long.
 * 7) Once all the nominations close, a summary of board candidates will be prepared and posted by the CRO to the OSGeo discuss list.

Voting

 * 1) Voting occurs roughly one week after nominations close.
 * 2) The CRO should ensure that all charter members receive the voting announcement - the OSGeo Secretary can provide a charter member list with contact info.
 * 3) Each charter member will have as many votes to use as there are board slots open (normally 4 or 5).
 * 4) All votes will be sent to cro@osgeo.org, which is archived and forwarded to the CRO for counting.
 * 5) Charter members may apply all their votes to a single person or distribute them in integral amounts over multiple candidates.
 * 6) The voting period is roughly 1 week long.
 * 7) Once complete the CRO tallies votes and the board slots are filled by the candidates with the most votes.
 * 8) In case of a vote tie, the CRO will use some suitable random method to select from the tied candidates for a board slot.
 * 9) The CRO will announce the selected board members on discuss@lists.osgeo.org.

= 2007 =

It is proposed that we start board nominations after completing a new round of charter membership selection, and that the selected CRO select 5 board members at random to be subject to re-election (or less if there are board members that wish to stand down from the board).

The OSGeo president proposes that Tyler Mitchell be designated CRO (and Secretary) for this election.

= Board Criteria =

Want to be a Board Member?
From http://flossfoundations.org/ Some reflections on making decisions about whether to get involved in foundational efforts:
 * Turn it down if you think you wouldn't make a good leader
 * Turn it down if you don't have time to do a good job.
 * Turn it down if you don't think they should be starting a foundation in the first place.
 * Turn it down if you don't care about the goals they're trying to accomplish.

Effort Level
Traditionally board members need to spend several hours a week on OSGeo related work. This includes a board conference call (approximately 1 hour) roughly twice a month. It also includes discussion on the board list, occasional face to face board meetings, and various liason activities to other OSGeo committees. The OSGeo board implies a large commitment of time and effort.

Positive Attributes
Some positive attributes for board members:
 * Already involved in or supporting OSGeo activities or projects
 * A commitment to the mission of the foundation.
 * A willingness to invest substantial amounts of time in support of OSGeo.
 * Diversity of geographic representation.
 * Diversity of project representation.
 * A cooperative and supportive working style (confrontational boards quickly become non-functioning boards).
 * Respected in the community.
 * Good communication skills.