Re: [gentoo-nfp] [Discussion] Refiling as a tax-exempt nonprofit.

[Michał Górny]

On Mon, 2020-07-20 at 15:50 -0700, Alec Warner wrote:
> The board had previously discussed this opportunity (including talking to
> the CPA about it) but I think we didn't really gather a consensus about it
> in 2019. I have not heard much about it in 2020 and I want it to raise it
> again as we begin fiscal 2021.
>
> I'm more open to this idea than I was in the past but I continue to have
> concerns about recruiting board members who will execute the duties
> required. While we could keep the current board when we create a new
> Foundation I'm curious how we could recruit additional members in the new
> Foundation.

I don't know if it's worth the effort.  The effort is better put into
disbanding GF and making Gentoo more sustainable, than making it harder
to keep GF afloat when we have a very bad track record of dealing with
the 'easier' variant.

As I've said in the other thread, it looks that we're spending 7% of our
cash donations on the CPA.  Our bookkeeping is suffering from a bus
factor of 1.  We aren't really effectively spending our donations
because we aren't really sure what we can spend it on.

The way I see it, this will only become worse after the change.  Surely,
we might get more money.  But will we actually spend it on Gentoo,
or hoard it and spend it mostly on operational costs?

>
> Some thoughts:
>  - We could recruit outside members of the board who are not Gentoo
> Developers, but had advocacy from other OSS projects.
>  - We could try to recruit or modify the way individuals are recruiter as
> Gentoo Developers, to make it easier to attract board members.
>

I don't really see how this changes anything.  If someone from 'outside'
would like to help out with Foundation (were any voices about it heard
so far?), I don't see why he wouldn't be able to join as an officer,
then get membership in return for the services rendered.

Unless your purpose is to lure people into becoming board members, so
that the implied responsibility would make them have to do some work.
 We all know how that worked in the last years.  I don't see how
changing the pool from developers/existing foundation members to random
people from outside would suddenly change the trend.

The problem is finding people who *want to* and *can* help, not finding
people who want to become board members and then maybe they will be
forced to help 'or else'.  Because these people won't help out, they
will only make things worse by blocking changes just so they could keep
their position.

-- 
Best regards,
Michał Górny