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Merged
merged 12 commits into from
Jul 31, 2019
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proposal: OpenJS Travel fund #268

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55127a5
travel fund, initial proposal
Jonahss Jul 17, 2019
637fe1f
feedback from @brianwarner
Jonahss Jul 18, 2019
4e44cdd
add an unresolved question
Jonahss Jul 21, 2019
0ac6807
remove step of transfering tools/accounts. @brianwarner says we're set
Jonahss Jul 21, 2019
e3b7b74
typo
Jonahss Jul 22, 2019
7b31c25
most the fund goes to attending collaborator summits.
Jonahss Jul 22, 2019
b665d08
Merge branch 'travel-fund' of github.com:Jonahss/cross-project-counci…
Jonahss Jul 22, 2019
511f3a6
remove treasurer role
Jonahss Jul 22, 2019
8b0ddea
add links to nodejs committees
Jonahss Jul 23, 2019
b047ac4
commcomm and tsc approval required
Jonahss Jul 23, 2019
2e28909
board approval required
Jonahss Jul 25, 2019
80bf564
improved wording for why the proposal is important
Jonahss Jul 27, 2019
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58 changes: 58 additions & 0 deletions proposals/stage-0/TRAVEL_FUND/README.md
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# OpenJS Travel Fund
> Stage 0

Tracked by https://github.com/openjs-foundation/cross-project-council/issues/172

## Champion

Jonah Stiennon @jonahss

## Description

The Node.js organizations that existed prior to the formation of the OpenJS foundation oversaw a monetary fund for the purpose of member and affiliate travel to, and lodging at, events related to the foundation's mission. This proposal proposes moving the management responsibilities of this fund to the Cross Project Council (CPC), and making the funds available to all members of this broader organization. Since all projects have voting representation on the CPC, the beneficiaries of the fund will jointly manage it, and the previous owners of the fund will still vote on its use.

We shall review the process in this proposal, but the intent is to leave the mechanics of the fund unchanged, simply moving from the purview of the Node.js project into the domain of the OpenJS Foundation, overseen by the CPC. This operation can be viewed as a refactor which moves the travel fund up one level in the organizational tree.

The current fund is used mostly for attending collaborator summits, and we do not expect this to change.

## Difference from the current process

The existing process requires approval from two members of the [Node.js TSC](https://github.com/nodejs/TSC) and two members of the [Node.js Community Committee](https://github.com/nodejs/community-committee).
The new process will require approval from four members of the CPC.
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@joyeecheung joyeecheung Jul 23, 2019

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What if the approvals all come from members who do not work on the project which the requester is affiliated with?

Will there be a limit for each project? If there isn't, is it possible that one project may end up using all of the funds, leaving very little for other projects? Or if there is, is it possible that one project may have their limit reached without having their members looking into their own allocations?

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@Jonahss Jonahss Jul 23, 2019

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Great questions. Here are my thoughts so far, but others should chime in:

What if the approvals all come from members who do not work on the project which the requester is affiliated with?

That should be fine. All requesters will be somehow affiliated with one of the projects, and the approvals come from members who collectively represent all the projects. Since the CPC is already balanced to not have too much representation from any one project, we shouldn't have to worry about one project having an unbalanced amount of control.
Also, the current wording for the fund outlines the potential for vetoes as well as approvals.

Will there be a limit for each project?

When it comes to allocations per project, I'd like to avoid such a system until it looks like we're going to need one. As of now, the travel fund is predominantly used for Node.js Interactive and Collaborator Summits. The considerations for request approval will not change, so preference will still be given to official OpenJS events such as the collaborator summit. With the fund shared by more people, I can see the budget may need to be raised to pay for more people to attend those events.

is it possible that one project may end up using all of the funds, leaving very little for other projects?

It looks like, among the impact project, only Appium and jQuery have independent events, while the rest of the projects typically host events at large javascript conferences. It is interesting to note that, had a member of Node.js asked for travel funds to attend these events, they would have qualified. If you think it necessary, we could add a clause to the Equity section of the considerations for approval, which could dictate preference given to projects which have not already had members who received funding recently.

Approvals to fund travel to events other than collaborator summits should not be allowed to drain the budget so that at the end of the year, it cannot fund travel to said summits. How is this currently prevented in the current organization of the fund?

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@mhdawson mhdawson Jul 23, 2019

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Approvals to fund travel to events other than collaborator summits should not be allowed to drain the budget so that at the end of the year, it cannot fund travel to said summits. How is this currently prevented in the current organization of the fund?

This is currently up to the members of the TSC/CommComm to manage. So far the requests have been limited in number so it has not been hard for the TSC/CommComm to manage that. For a fund serving more projects it might be more complicated...

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@Jonahss Jonahss Jul 23, 2019

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It sounds like performing a quick count of the number of members being added here would help in planning for the addition. Would you like me to do that and get some round numbers to help us prepare in an informed way?

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@bnb bnb Jul 24, 2019

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The word "preference" is used in this thread and in the current policy. How is that word defined in this context?

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@joyeecheung joyeecheung Jul 30, 2019 •
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@Jonahss That sounds great! I think we just need to at least have some numbers to keep the budget under control - they don't even need to be accurate e.g. if we got ~30 estimated trip funding request for the year from the survey, we would not go too far by allocating for 10 or 100.

At least as someone who used to approve these requests from time to time, it's really difficult to tell whether the request that I was reading was going to affect the whole budget or not, unless it was sent after the Interactive near the end of the year. We did a funding survey for the Interactive last year which helped us having an idea about the expected balance and being assured that we were unlikely to need to allocate more from the foundation before the event. It would be very useful if a survey like that can be done before allocating the budget from foundation.

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@joyeecheung joyeecheung Jul 30, 2019 •
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On a side note, it should be quite helpful if the survey includes questions about whether the requester are up for room-sharing (and any preference about their roommates), as that should cut down the lodging cost significantly compared to people booking the rooms separately. (it would also be nice if they could stay in the same or close hotels as it's safer and gives you more time to socialize with other attendees). But yeah this is just some idea from past experience, not a blocker for the proposal :)

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@Jonahss Jonahss Jul 30, 2019

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That's great context, thanks!

Yes I think for the next stage, I'll go out and survey all the projects for their anticipated use of travel funds.

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@mhdawson mhdawson Jul 30, 2019

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@joyeecheung good ideas. I think this is a good time to discuss new ideas/ways of doing things. Not that it should block this landing as stage-0, but good to have those ideas discussed as it gets broader discussion and moves to later stages.

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@Jonahss Jonahss Jul 30, 2019

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In the next PR, I'll include the documents in question, and then we can review and edit those in the review :)


The role of fund "treasurer" will be removed, as it has been found to be redundant and is not currently filled (see https://github.com/openjs-foundation/cross-project-council/pull/268#issuecomment-513888283).

## Practical Specifics

- Move relevant files from nodejs/admin to openjs-foundation/cross-project-council such as:
- https://github.com/nodejs/admin/blob/master/MEMBER_TRAVEL_FUND.md
- https://github.com/nodejs/admin/tree/master/TravelFunds
- https://github.com/nodejs/admin/blob/master/travel-visas.md
- https://github.com/nodejs/admin/blob/master/expense-report-template.xls
- https://github.com/nodejs/admin/blob/master/reimbursement_process.pdf
- Modify these files to account for OpenJS rather than Node.js organizations
- Remove mentions from nodejs/admin README, add links to CPC README
- Remove the role of treasurer

## Required Resources

@brianwarner reports that everything can stay the same for the tools and accounts involved.
No other resources required.

## How would success be measured?

Success will be achieved if Node.js and non-Node.js members use the travel fund to attend a Foundation-related event, and nobody notices the difference.

## Why this proposal is important

The Node.js project has demonstrated the value of providing a travel fund which allows project members to get together at collaborator summits and to represent/advocate for the project at other events. It is important to expand the travel fund (both resource and usage) so that other projects can benefit as well.

## Unresolved Questions

- Who is the current treasurer of the fund?

## What is necessary to complete this proposal

- Approval and buy-in from Node.js TSC and CommComm.
- OpenJS board approval
- Definition and wording of the travel fund mechanics, mostly moving files and updating references.
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@mcollina mcollina Jul 23, 2019

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I would like approval and buy in from both node.js TSC and CommComm on this one before moving it to Stage 3.

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@mhdawson mhdawson Jul 23, 2019

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+1

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@Jonahss Jonahss Jul 23, 2019

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I was hoping for a couple suggested people I could @mention here, to get feedback from the get-go. Who would you suggest?

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@Trott Trott Jul 23, 2019

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It's unfortunate that @-mentioning nodejs teams doesn't cause notifications in this org. Otherwise, it would be a simple @nodejs/tsc @nodejs/community-committee

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@Jonahss Jonahss Jul 23, 2019

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Oh okay, that’s easy. I’ll create an issue in nodejs/admin and mention both those teams. Thanks.

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@Jonahss Jonahss Jul 23, 2019

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We decided in today’s meeting that an issue should be created in the admin repo, @mention the two teams, include a link to this proposal, and additionally include a link to the proposal staging process.
But we thought to merge this as a stage-0 proposal first, after the conversations here are resolved, so the conversation about promotion to stage-1 can start fresh with larger involvement.