Dear Affcom, Tanvir, and Asaf,
We answered Affcom's last question to us about the proposed Cascadia Wikimedians group on August 7th, over a month ago. I have attempted to contact Affcom a number of times to check on the status of our application, but the last information that I received was on August 17th, which was over 3 weeks ago. We have projects that we want to do but we are waiting for Affcom approval before we launch them. This is a busy time of year here in Cascadia and I feel it is important that we get ourselves launched as soon as possible. We had anticipated receiving approval from you before now. We would appreciate an update about when we can expect to hear from you about the status of our application.
Also, are we allowed to set up social media accounts using the Cascadia Wikimedians name while we wait for your approval? We would like to use social media to recruit and coordinate for our events, and I have heard that other thematic organizations have done this prior to receiving recognition from Affcom.
My understanding is that user groups are intended by the WMF Board to be lightweight and easy to set up. The amount of time that this approval process is taking is problematic for us here in Cascadia, and the lack of communication and a clear timeframe for approval are also making it difficult for us to have the impact that we would like to have.
Thank you,
Pine