INKSCAPE

Draw Freely

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A majority vote of the current board members is required for the following matter.

Proposal:

A majority vote of the current board members is required for the following matter.

Adopt Election Procedure version 4, as shown in Addendum for the Inkscape Board’s official procedure for holding Board Elections. Diverging from this procedure is not allowed without board approval.

• 1. Accept Election Procedure v.4 as official election procedure
• 2. Accept Election Procedure, if the following changes are done: __________________________________________ __________________________________________
• 3. Do not accept Election Procedure

Votes:

Resolution:

The Election Proceedure is updated.

Background:

This procedure is derived from the election procedure v.3.

It mostly updates the procedure to not quote the FSA (so we have to vote on the election process again when the FSA is updated), but link to it. The FSA has changed the way membership is defined, and this is reflected here.

Change History

Addendum:

File: election_procedure.txt

Inkscape is holding elections for ${NUM_SEATS} new Board Members.

${INTRODUCTION_TEXT}

The term “board” in this document is equivalent with “Project Leadership Committee”, as both terms are usually used interchangeably within the Inkscape project.

Typically the board votes on things such as project fund expenditures (travel, conferences, marketing materials for events, etc), trademark related issue, other legal issues that arise, etc. The board does not have responsibility currently for technical decisions for the project, and does not handle social/community issues where there are no financial or legal aspects to the problem.

Board membership requires a commitment of time: At a minimum you will be expected to participate in votes on the mailing list, which typically occur with a frequency of about 0 to 3 per month. You are required to be on the board mailing list, which has a low volume; you’re not required to participate in the discussions, but it is very strongly encouraged. We also solicit volunteers from the board to serve as as event managers, team leaders, fundraising coordinators, etc. - Again, not a requirement, but we value board members who can shoulder such duties for the project. It is also expected of board members to actively participate in the project and follow ongoing discussions.

As specified in Section 6 or our fiscal sponsorship agreement (FSA) [1] we maintain a committee of seven project members.

Election Schedule:

All dates are 8:00 UTC.

The number of days between the end of the candidacy period and the start of the election may be chosen by the proctor, but must not be higher than 7 days.

Membership:

Inkscape community members listed in the Membership list as of ${date + 2 weeks} are considered Members for purposes of this election, as per our Fiscal Sponsorship Agreement with the Software Freedom Conservancy. Only Members may run for the board positions, and only Members may vote for them.

The Election Proctor may select the voting platform for the election.

${HOWTO_VOTE_DIRECTIONS}

Election Proctor:

The Inkscape Board elects by majority vote an Election Proctor who will run a given election and ensure its successful completion. The Election Proctor has the responsibility for ensuring the voting is done according to procedure, assuring that the Vote is accurately tallied, and announcing the finalized result of the Vote.

Once the vote has been finalized, the selected individual(s) immediately become Board Members.

The Community may challenge the Election Proctor’s tally within 30 days of the vote finalization, by gathering a number of signatures from Members exceeding 2/3rds of the total number of Votes cast declaring the vote to be inaccurate. Should this happen, the Vote is nullified, and a new election must be arranged by the Board.

Board Election:

The following text can be used to draft an announcement about the election, which should be sent to Inkscape’s announcement and development mailing lists.

The following Board Members have resigned from their positions and need to be filled by new members:

${RETIREES}

The election process starts with a Candidacy Period, i.e. members listed in the membership list, during which any Member may indicate interest in running for the positions. To register, please email ${ELECTIONS_ADDRESS}, giving your

• Name [2]
• Current professional affiliation
• Statement of contribution to Inkscape or related technologies
• A personal statement

Alternatively, any Member may nominate another Member, who has to send the above email if they are willing to candidate.

At the end of the Candidacy Period, the applicants will be reviewed to verify eligibility. The list of candidates will then be published, and the community will have a chance to ask questions.

Finally, the election will be held using the Single Transferable Vote (STV) voting system[3]. This is similar in mechanism to the Instant Runoff Vote (IRV), but for multi-seat results rather than the single-winner result of IRV. From a voter’s perspective it’s the same voting procedure: Rank candidates in order of choice with #1 being first choice, and so on.

References:

1: https://inkscape.org/*leadership-committee/charter/

2: Pseudonyms are acceptable for registration purposes, but please note that your legal name will need to be provided when officially joining the board as a member, and may be needed on various legal documents which will be publicly disclosed for transparency purposes.

3: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Single_transferable_vote