Council 2005 09

in attendance
martin (scribe), oso (facilitator), pete, dave, matthew, phil, laurel, seamus, debi, liane, charno, christen, guy, marie, jeff, clout, shawn, matteo, trevor, jim fitterman, richard (scribe checker), wren, bobby, wes

previous commitments

 * pickups for money: CARRYOVER
 * homestreet: almost done with all freegeek's commitments. yay!
 * ibm laptops: lost driving force with clint, noone has desire to spearhead the project. DROPPED

pawc
retreat on oct 19 to reorganize pawc. all council invited. $5 food fee. ask matteo or shawn if you have questions.

flowmaster m
(Advanced Receiving)

matthew gave a report on his position (See his report at: http://lists.freegeek.org/pipermail/council/2005-September/001348.html )

he has recommended that his "proposed" position does not have the potential for financial gain that was expected. he recommends that his position be dispensed with in favor of more useful tasks.


 * clout: what about testing exotic components? this is important, but difficult and takes space and time.
 * shawn: what should advanced receiving be? send things to advanced testing often, set standards based on what we'reactually receiving, and send things to the store untested for cheaper.
 * jeff: shouldn't your job be about finding the exotic gizmos that should be moved more into our standard? yes, this is important.
 * christen: what position do you recommend freegeek add to its collective? operations coordination
 * wes: can we allow people to test things themselves, or sell things untested? no they can't test them themselves. selling junk isn't good for our reputation.  we could sell through wacky willies.

old business
none

financial report
paying our staff less, getting donations, and selling more has turned our propensity to overspend into a small profit-making ability, although we still are overall in debt for this year. $14,576 in liabilities, no real assets.

other than digging ourselves out of that, we have goals of paying our staff more, expanding our staff, accruing a one month emergency fund, and doing some construction. we can do these things when we have savings equal to the montly cost they will incur (for instance, when we have saved enough to hire someone and not expect that this money is going to be needed immediately).

we have been increasing every quarter since we opened. staff are no longer taking leaves of absence.

his report was emailed and is at: http://lists.freegeek.org/pipermail/council/2005-September/001355.html

(also see the lovely pie charts and whatnot at http://wiki.freegeek.org/index.php/Financial_Overview )

financial future has been thought about (financial optimization meeting, meta question, &c.), and continue to be worked on (matthew's position was about this).

personnel aid
(sending people to Uganda, and other distant places)

(scribe presented, so notes are scarce)

DECISION: a subcommittee shall be formed from council and including the propagation committee and they should meet both before and after this current uganda project is over in order to bring a proposal back with policy regarding sending people places. oso, pete, dave, laurel, martin, wren, jeff, clout, matteo, jim, phil, bobbie, christen, guy, richard, and trevor are interested in being on this.

nominees
laurel, seamus, pete, marie, wren, bob (not present), joe (not present), oso

has Mark Niemann-Ross (past board member) been asked? yes, he said no (but perhaps in the future)

charno (eurotrash =:) takes over facilitation for this item. the board has a lot of financial, fiduciary, and legal responsibilities. 2 is the legal minimum, 3 is freegeek's previous minimum, and the new bylaws (ratified last council meeting) put the minimum at 5 and the maximum at 11. the board has set the current number to 7 and its the councils' job to select those 7 people. there are eight nominees. it shouldn't be as big as it can possibly be, as council is where the general policy making happens, and the board acts as a financial and legal check, not the rest of a board's "traditional" responsibilities. the current board set the initial number of members at 7, in fact, so we have to pick that many.

(or then again, the board is here, so they could call a meetings and officially change the number.)

the board can harm freegeek when they have conflicting interests, if they abuse their legal or financial powers.

(recap of what we want from the council...)

(See http://wiki.freegeek.org/index.php/New_Director_Contract and the extensive discussion at http://wiki.freegeek.org/index.php/Talk:Board_of_Directors for a fuller discussion.)

BOARD CANDIDATE PRESENTATION
pete
 * years of experience here: ASS, build, council. freegeek is vital to how he thinks portland should exist.  scared that freegeek will overfragment itself, loves our recycling and reuse programs.  has IT experience.  will smack down revphil.

laurel
 * she has seen the board change over the years and would like to see it into its future. thinks the board should focus on keeping freegeek in check so that our core programs can thrive.  she is interested in learning more about legal stuff. she has proofreading powers.

seamus
 * software engineer. education coordinator coordinator.  olympia film society non-profit experience. interested in the structured organization of minutia relating to bylaws, our relations to the big scary laws.  wants to make sure freegeek has the structure and language needed to support it in all the crazy things we do.

wren
 * build instructor at freegeek, some ASSery. very interested in the different things freegeek has done, and believes us to be important to portland.  active council participation.  interest in the long term freegeek plans, and preventing our current activities from being too short-sighted.  likes language.

oso
 * founded a freegeek once, you may have heard about it. very concerned and dedicated to everything about freegeek. he has no place else to go.

marie
 * works at meyer trust, and has worked on freegeek grant requests. her son blaine volunteers here every day (and is awesome).  greatly values the place freegeek provides to its volunteers.  a lot of nonprofit experience throughout her life, and currently works with many of them every day.  she wants to help freegeek find new sources of income.

joe (through charno)
 * lawyer who has already helped us draft our new bylaws. works mostly with divorce.  has volunteered with us already, and loves freegeek and our mission.  has contacts amoung nonprofit lawyers, and is generally legal-minded.

bob (presented by charno)
 * long time volunteer in build, lots of nonprofit experience, very good voice. gives a great tour.

Q & A

 * jeff: Marie, will you have a conflict of interest working for meyer?
 * Marie: meyer had a policy to prevent this, but has recently dropped it and is now encouraging their employees to be on boards. she can also excuse herself on any decisions which would be in conflict.


 * phil: wren may have to leave in a year?
 * answer: so will half of the board! so say our bylaws.  four 2-year position and three 1-year positions will be set.

(candidates leave)

(scribe is turned off)

(we talked about the candidates)

(we talked about our needs)

(ordered by proposal length to prevent you board nominees from thinking we have preferences)

DECISIONS
DECISION: Put oso and laurel on the board.

PROPOSAL: put seamus on the board. DEFFERED

DECISION: Put marie on the board.

PROPOSAL: put wren on the board. DEFFERED

PROPOSAL: put pete on the board. DEFFERED

DECISION: Put joe on the board.

DECISION: Put bob on the board.

general concerns: we don't want board members who get on the board because they want to (be on council|do outreach|decide our future), but rather that they are interested in being the responsible voice to keep us in check?

DECISION: accept two vacancies for a month, and fill them in next month. we don't really need more nominees as we did not have enough time to discuss all current ones, but more can apply in the interim.

DECISION: let the board pick their numbering and terms.

(note that wren and pete did eval while we discussed them, whereas the rest of the nominees that were present went to the acme.)

next meeting
facilitator: richard

scribe: revphil

note review: richard

date: october 19th, 7:15

commitments
propagation: set up meeting regarding sending people places.

next agenda
more board elections