[members] preparing for elections

[Allison Randal]

On 5/29/10 2:54 AM, James E Keenan wrote:
> AFAICT, this thread is the first correspondence on the parrot-members
> list since our last board election/annual meeting in August 2009. So,
> perhaps this would be a good time to ask questions like these:
>
> * What are the responsibilities of members of the Parrot Foundation
> board of directors?

Their primary responsibility is to act as custodians of the intellectual 
property behind Parrot, and to assist the Parrot community.

There's a good section on "Purpose" at the beginning of the foundation 
bylaws:

http://www.parrot.org/files/bylaws.pdf

> * What has the current board done since August 2009?

- Worked with legal advisors on keeping Parrot current with non-profit 
requirements, and on 501(c)(3) application.
- Filed taxes for the foundation.
- Collected and archived CLAs for Parrot.
- Coordinated Parrot's involvement in Google Summer of Code (through TPF).
- Admin'd Parrot services (svn, trac, web site, mailing lists, domain 
registration, SSL certificates), in partnership with OSU OSL.

In previous years the foundation also:

- Sponsored development grants.
- Sponsored travel and accommodation for in-person Parrot Developer Summit.
- Sponsored travel and accommodation of representatives to speak at 
other conferences.
- Facilitated the transfer of copyright from The Perl Foundation to the 
Parrot Foundation.

> * What, if anything, do we expect the 2010-11 board to do differently
> from the 2009-10 board?

- Complete the 501(c)(3) application.
- Some fundraising to cover (modest) operating expenses. Additional 
funds for grants would be a nice extra, but not required.
- Formalize the process for bringing in new members, establish a 
membership review committee.

We're also looking at diversifying our language representation on the 
board, inviting candidates from Python, Ruby, and PHP communities.

> (I should add that I think it's fine for us to say, "We have a board of
> directors because non-profit corporations are required to have a board,
> and during 2009-10 we didn't expect our board members to do much more
> than that.")

Also true. :)

> * Are there area of decision-making that would be the province of the
> board that differ from, say, those of our semi-annual-ish online
> developer summits?

Yes, the board of directors has no involvement in decision-making for 
development issues. (By coincidence, at the moment, some of the people 
on the board happen to also be leaders in the development side of the 
project, but the two roles are completely separate.) The board is 
concerned with legal issues, "business" issues, and some aspects of 
community building/health.

Thanks, Jim. Great questions!

Allison