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PostgreSQL Funds Group

Last updated: March 1, 2019. View change history.

Charter

Governance Charter of the Relationship between the PostgreSQL project and Software in the Public Interest, Inc.

Core Team Membership

The Core Team of the PostgreSQL project consists of the people currently listed on the contributors page.

The Core Team appoints its own members.

Fundraising Group Membership

The Fundraising Group (a.k.a. Funds Group) of the PostgreSQL project initially consisted of the members of The PostgreSQL Foundation Inc. that were active at the time of its termination. Thereafter, the Fundraising Group appoints its own members using the normal procedures for proposals and votes, as described below. The current membership is shown here.

Fundraising Group Elected Positions

The Fundraising Group elects an SPI Liaison and an Deputy SPI Liaison. The appointments are subject to the veto of the Core Team. The appointments do not have an explicit duration, but either may be replaced at any time using the normal procedures for proposals and votes, as described below.

The duty of the SPI Liaison is primarily to represent the interests and decisions of the Fundraising Group to SPI. Additionally the SPI Liaison will submit to SPI on an ongoing basis a list of persons eligible for automatic SPI contributing membership in recognition of their contributions to the PostgreSQL project.

The duty of the Deputy SPI Liaison is to perform the duties of the SPI Liaison in the case that the SPI Liaison is unavailable for a non-trivial amount of time, or upon explicit request of the SPI Liaison or the Fundraising Group.

Proposals and Voting

Proposals must be made explicitly via email on the funds group mailing list, and be seconded prior to discussion and voting.

Decisions require discussion and voting in accordance with how the fundraising group votes in order to be valid.

Voting

Methods

Votes may be collected using either of two methods:

  • Openly on the mailing list
    • Anything reasonably clear as to the vote is acceptable, e.g.
      • Yes: yes/+1/aye/yea/affirmative
      • No: no/-1/nay,negative
      • Abstain: abstain/0/pass
  • Confidentially via private email to 2 selected members (Vote Collectors)

Open Voting Details

If the vote is determined to be done with the Open Voting method, all votes will be sent directly to the mailing list. Voting results should be summarized by the member making the motion once the voting period is closed. Any member can review the openly available votes for verification of the results.

Confidential Voting Details

If the vote is determined to be done with the Confidential Voting method, the member who makes the motion may propose the Vote Collectors. The Vote Collectors must agree to this responsibility. If they reject the request, other members must be selected until 2 are found which agree. If no members are specifically selected, the default Vote Collectors are the SPI Liaison and the Alternate SPI Liaison.

  • Members will send their ballot to both Vote Collectors using the email address subscribed to the Funds Group mailing list
  • Both Vote Collectors will tabulate the votes independently
  • Votes which do not appear on both lists will be discarded after contacting the member involved to allow them to re-vote. Although not required, email voting should utilize use PGP to sign the vote if possible.
  • Ballots are confidential. They may not be shared except by the Vote Collectors for verification purposes.
  • The Vote Collectors should post an email to the Funds Group mailing list no later then 24 hours before the end of the vote, listing who has voted, as a reminder to all to vote and notification those whose ballot may not have been received.
  • The vote results should be posted to the mailing list within 24 hours of the vote closing.

Process

Fund Requests

  • Fund requests must be for reimbursement of expenditures which generally fit within the funding request guidelines.
  • Fund requests less than or equal to $1000 USD may go through the following special process:
    • Any member may forward the request to the Funds Group mailing list, or the request might come directly to the list via moderation
    • If there are no objections, the Liaison may approve and fund the request after 72 hours
    • If there are any objections the request must be processed as any other motion, as discussed below
  • Fund requests greater than $1000 USD must be processed as any other motion, as discussed below

Motions

  • All current members of the Funds Group may submit a motion
  • Any other current member must second all motions
  • All current members of the Funds Group are eligible to vote
  • Debate:
    • Shall commence once the motion is seconded
    • Shall take place on the mailing list
    • Shall end no sooner than 72 hours after the motion was seconded, unless a longer debate period was specifically requested as part of the motion (in no case shall debate be less than 72 hours)
    • May be extended through a no-debate motion which is seconded and approved via the Open Voting method
  • Votes:
    • Shall take place on the mailing list or privately as discussed below
    • Quorum is 5 voting members, or (TRUNCATE(TRUNCATE(N/3)/2)*2) + 1 where N is the number of active members, whichever is larger -- for example, with 18 active members, (TRUNCATE(TRUNCATE(N/3)/2)*2) + 1 = 7, so the quorum is 7
    • Determined by a simple majority vote, of the voting members
    • Allow the option to "abstain" -- votes of "abstain" are counted as participating for quorum purposes
    • Will remain open for 72 hours from the end of debate, unless a longer voting period was specifically requested as part of the motion (in no case shall voting be less than 72 hours)
  • Method
    • The voting method may be determined by the member who makes the motion
    • If no voting method is thus determined, the vote takes place using the Open Voting method, on the mailing list
    • Only one method will be used per vote.

Funding Requests

Requesting Funding

Types of Fund Requests

Examples of Funds Group fund requests:

  • Travel to technical conferences or tradeshows
    • We have provided funds to assist speakers of various PostgreSQL related conferences with their travel expenses
  • Swag (T-shirts, folders, flyers, etc.)
  • Cost of operations
    • PostgreSQL community infrastructure (for web, email, git, etc.)
  • Professional services (video editing, graphics)

How to Request Funds

To request funding, send an email to [email protected] describing:

  • What you are seeking funds for
  • Total estimated amount of requested funds

What is Considered for Funding Approval

If requesting funds to provide a talk:

  • Where the talk is being held
  • Expected attendance to the talk
  • Cost
  • Will you provide the talk under a FOSS or Creative Commons license

If requesting funds for an event:

  • Are you charging for the event
  • Where are the proceeds going
  • What will the result of the event be?
  • What is the benefit to the community?

Professional Services Funding

Funding requests will be evaluated, if for professional services such as video editing, graphics design etc., according to the following (not necessarily complete) set of criteria:

  • What is the benefit to the community
  • At least one competitive bid
    • References for each vendor
    • Your recommendation for which vendor to select and why
  • Provide an estimate from the selected vendor in writing
    • The estimate should include exactly what will be provided
    • How much wiggle room we have (executive edits, moves, adds, changes)
    • When the services will be delivered
    • What the deliverable is

We are not necessarily looking for the cheapest solution, but rather the overall best solution. We may be willing to pay more if a particular provider has a significantly superior track record (for example).