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2025-03-24 Community Council Meeting Minutes

2025-03-24 Community Council Meeting Minutes

Attendees

@Shawn Nicholson @Christopher Spalding @spampell @Johanna Radding @Joseph Grobelny @Simeon Warner (and after adjourning @Kirstin Kemner-Heek )

Guests: @Maccabee Levine@Paul Kloppenborg @Jenn Colt

Regrets: @Boaz Nadav Manes @Maike Osters @Mike Gorrell @Edwin Pretz @Rachael Kotarski

Note Taker: @Simeon Warner

Discussion items

Item

Who

@Notes

Item

Who

@Notes

Note taker

@Simeon Warner

Note taker for April 14? @Kirstin Kemner-Heek

Governance changes

@Simeon Warner

Last revision https://folio-org.atlassian.net/wiki/download/attachments/800423938/2024 FOLIO Governance Review - Clarifications Proposal 2025-02-24 CC approved.docx?api=v2 was agreed by CC inhttps://folio-org.atlassian.net/wiki/x/AoC1Lw?atlOrigin=eyJpIjoiZDUxMTk5MDM5YmEyNDAxZWE3ZTZjNzJiMmNkN2ViMDAiLCJwIjoiYyJ9 , ratified by TC but rejected with a request for additional changes by PC. The two changes requested are:

  1. Add “the following” in the opening sentence of the introduction to avoid the suggestion that all of decision making or at least the top level are under control of the councils, which is not the case. The introduction will then become:

    1. This FOLIO Governance Model distributes the following responsibilities and decision making among three councils: Community, Product and Technical. It allows organizations to be recognized as members whether they commit to paying dues or donating the time of people to do the work needed to create and sustain FOLIO. It allows all participants in the community to select council members. It outlines a dues structure to address the financial needs of the project, and provides for financial management via the Community Council.

  2. Add a requirement about how many non-abstaining members of a council a required to vote when there is a quorum. It was noted that as currently written, the voting process could lead to scenarios where a single "yay" or "nay" vote would constitute a majority which perhaps doesn’t foster consensus-driven decision making. There are two proposals:

    • We could require a majority of those present (which must be at least a quorum) to vote rather than abstaining, otherwise the vote is tabled until the next meeting or taken asynchronous vote.

    • A (absolute?) majority of council members must vote (i.e., not abstain) for a decision to be reached. – this basically would require that a quorum vote which would be a high bar if only a quorum or slightly above were present.

    • ==> Suggested edit:

      • Council decisions are made by “lazy consensus” (Decision-Making ), when possible, and documented to the public. If necessary to reach a decision, any council member may call for a vote. Votes require a simple majority of those voting (ie. not abstaining) at a scheduled meeting where a quorum is present, provided that a majority of those members present vote. A quorum of any council is a majority of the membership of the council (ie. 8 if a council has 14 members, 7 if the council has 13 members). Alternatively, votes that are carried out asynchronously require a simple majority of the entire council membership.

New draft with the two edits above https://folio-org.atlassian.net/wiki/download/attachments/895549450/2024 FOLIO Governance Review - Clarifications Proposal 2025-03-24.docx?api=v2

ACTION - No quorum so Simeon to take the above changes to a Slack vote

  • 2025-03-25 Result: AGREED: 11 in favor (@Kirstin Kemner-Heek @Joseph Grobelny @Rachael Kotarski @Christopher Spalding @Johanna Radding @Shawn Nicholson @Maike Osters @Edwin Pretz @Mike Gorrell @Boaz Nadav Manes @Simeon Warner ), 1 against (@spampell )

  • Next step is to ask PC and TC to ratify

 

@Christopher Spalding @Simeon Warner

Outcomes and action items from the DC summit:

  • Consensus in discussion that the community should have have a key role in the sustainability of FOLIO. We need to better articulate what is needed for sustainability and need to increase funds raised. This will best be done by increasing community participation with a broader base of institutions.

  • AGREEMENT of CC by vote that we are OK to encourage representatives to stand for Council positions with a promise of FY26 membership (membership is a requirement to be seated)

  • Small group to develop short-term FY26 changes in membership model/levels - Simeon (lead), Kat, Steven, Kirstin.

    • Think about a mechanism for collecting information about contributions (perhaps option for MOU or other reporting)

    • Do ready for April 28 CC meeting

  • Longer term contribution/membership/budget/community responsibility modeling - Christopher (lead), Kat, Simeon, Shawn, Mike

    • Suggest P&L approach breaking down income streams and expense types for dev/maintenance/infra/etc/

    • Christopher (with input from Mike) to do pre-work on costs

    • Start after April

  • Develop approach to measure what the community does and how much it costs now - Tom, Jenn (lead), Shawn, Kat (fly on wall)

    • Want to develop process for ongoing measurement

    • Counting has implicit suggestion of what has value

  • Form group to create a vision for how to cultivate an active healthy software development contribution network: Mike (lead), Boaz, Stephen, Christopher

    • First draft by April 28 CC meeting

  • Group for vision statement - stephen (lead), joe, shawn/claude, jesse

    • Deadline 14th april to share at CC meeting

    • Christopher will ask whether Hannah Murphy can join

  • TC is working on plans for app approval process; still need to get around to platform definition but will likely deal with bugfest and testing plans first

    • Ongoing

  • Agreement that it is too early to ask PC to do further work on App grouping. TC is currently working on App specification and these proposals will come to PC for review, app by app.

  • Refinement of letter to non-member institutions - Shawn, Joe, Kat

    • Include possibility of end-of-year donation

  • End of year contributions to be pushed via the OLF newsletter. Ask to Hannah Murphy (Christopher) to include.

  • Line item contributions via EBSCO and IndexData hosting - NO ACTION YET

    • Need a description of how funds used

    • CC needs to send to vendors as proposal

    • Naming: 

      • Suggest not membership

      • “Free as in kitten not beer fund”

      • Community operations / test env. / sustainability

    • Scope questions

      • Does it include support for staffing?

      • Need to think about longer term plan so we don’t keep coming back with additional asks

    • Timeline: before WOLFcon

  • Develop plan for developing blueprint for FOLIO community and software ecosystem and marketplace - Tom (on the plane)

    • Want to have timeline of when things need to be developed

Draft letter to community members

@Shawn Nicholson @Joseph Grobelny

  • Changes from in-person meeting

  • Plan of action?

 

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