I suspect that there may be pushback from the community about it being "taken over" by the WMF, if it were run by staff. There's also the issue with other countries - if we hold Wikimania in London, the WMF would not really be able to help, as they'd have no contacts and would be running the whole event at a year's notice, which isn't very long at all in conference terms.
The UK chapter has an events organiser who handled all our scholarships this year. People had their hotels, hostels, and flights booked for them, and she sent out the details to everyone. Having a WMF person in charge of some of the process would be very useful, but having the WMF run the entire event may not be an ideal solution.
Personally, I'd like to see a core WMF events team who help all major events (Wikimania-sized), but liaise with volunteers on them. Very difficult to do in practice, but better than the current system of unsupported volunteers running a conference. James Hare is doing a wonderful job, but running a conference AND being a student is a very, very difficult thing to do, and I fear we'll start to burn out valuable volunteers if we're not careful - or adversely impact their studies.
I'd also like to see Wikimania moved to a two-year-in-advance system, rather than a one-year-in-advance as we have now. One year is not enough time to plan a conference.
I never suggested a take-over.
The problem is majority of the framework, or lack thereof, has remained the same years after the first Wikimania. Every year someone from the community, most commonly James, takes a lead to announce a jury, and wikipedians with no experience organizing international events, bid, the jury picks and they are on their own from that point onward. Every year, there are more or less the same problems with visas, accommodations. And every year a discussion ensues after the event with the suggestion of adding a gap year or de-emphasizing Wikimania for local event. I don't think a two-year-in-advance system will change anything, as long as its the same embassies, the same visas, and the same issues. One year is plenty of time, most countries don't permit visa application more than 3 months before the departure date, many venues don't allow booking 2 year in advance,
same for caterers and hotels. Whatever quote you receive that far in advance is likely to change months before the actual event.
In the mean time, Wikimanias have become larger and larger with more people from more countries attending. There are issues that need professional help at this point, even partly would help. At the end of the year, we don't have to throw away the know-how acquired, and then start fresh the next year. I never suggested WMF should organize the event, the organizing team should, but that is all they should be expected to do - organize the event in their city, the rest of the administrative tasks before the event should be shared by someone more experienced.
Certain administrative tasks, things like bulk-bookings, paper-work, visa issues can be handled centrally. They can even generate a lot of cost-savings in the process if done right. This doesn't mean de-emphasizing or taking away anything from the ground team, but facilitating them, giving them options, or taking care of the tasks they don't want, so they can focus on the actual event itself, not the pre-event arrangements. I'm not even talking about an events team, just a single person to begin with.
Regards
Theo