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proposal: OpenJS Travel fund #268

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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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# OpenJS Travel Fund
> Stage 0

Tracked by https:/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.
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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 and two members of the Node.js Community Committee.
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The new process will require approval from four members of the CPC.
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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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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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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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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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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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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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@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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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:/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:/nodejs/admin/blob/master/MEMBER_TRAVEL_FUND.md
- https:/nodejs/admin/tree/master/TravelFunds
- https:/nodejs/admin/blob/master/travel-visas.md
- https:/nodejs/admin/blob/master/expense-report-template.xls
- https:/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

Organizationally, the Node.js project is at the same level as the other impact projects in the Foundation, and so the travel fund should benefit all projects equally in opportunity. Plus, the sponsorships which pay for the fund sponsor the entire Foundation, not just the Node.js project.
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One of the assumption here is that the Node.js project should not receive any less funding due to the merger. I think this should be clarified.

cc @Trott.

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I think that that depends more upon the board's discretion with the budget, but I can add language to suggest that the budget be raised to accommodate the increase in people asking for funding.

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@mhdawson mhdawson Jul 23, 2019 •
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One of the assumptions here is that the Node.js project should not receive any less funding due to the merger.

How could we ensure this if there is a common fund and approvals are done by CPC members?
Or is your clarification more around explaining what we'll do so that it will mostly likely be the case (since for example we've expanded the size of the fund so that we expect that all requests from members of the Node.js project in addition to the request from members of other projects can be accomodated)

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Or is your clarification more around explaining what we'll do so that it will mostly likely be the case (since for example we've expanded the size of the fund so that we expect that all requests from members of the Node.js project in addition to the request from members of other projects can be accomodated)

Yes, that is what I meant. I'd like to avoid codifying specific quotas and rules unless we actually need them. Since it doesn't even appear that there has ever been an issue of abuse of this fund, or lack of budget.

Should we count the number of new members being added to the fund due to the foundation merge, calculate the percentage increase, and get pre-approval of an expanded budget before continuing?

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Should we count the number of new members being added to the fund due to the foundation merge, calculate the percentage increase, and get pre-approval of an expanded budget before continuing?

I think so. The overall expectation was that Node.js would not suffer from the merger.

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@mcollina

Can we further discuss the wording you'd prefer to see here? I had a little trouble understanding your latest comment.

My reading of this is to remove the travel fund from Node.js in a way that will definitely not benefit the project.

The purpose of the CPC is to benefit all the projects.
My goal with this proposal is to keep things the same for the Node.js project, but extend the benefits to the other projects. Could you be satisfied by some future research where I provide numbers for current usage trends, and an increased budget to preserve the current benefits to the Node.js members, while extending the benefits to all projects?

This year, I am given to understand that some of the non-Node.js project members were awarded travel funds to attend the collaborator summit in Berlin. Do you feel that this caused a negative impact to the Node.js project?

Board approval is necessary to complete the proposal. I will add that to the text now.

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I suggest changing

Organizationally, the Node.js project is at the same level as the other impact projects in the Foundation, and so the travel fund should benefit all projects equally in opportunity. Plus, the sponsorships which pay for the fund sponsor the entire Foundation, not just the Node.js project.

with:

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.

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@mcollina is that along the lines of what you were thinking?

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Yes exactly, thanks.

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Sounds great! Made the change suggested.


## Unresolved Questions

- Who is the current treasurer of the fund?

## What is necessary to complete this proposal

- Definition and wording of the travel fund mechanics, mostly moving files and updating references.
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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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+1

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

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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.