[Foundation-l] A new proposal regarding US chapters

[Anthony]

On Tue, May 6, 2008 at 3:51 PM, Birgitte SB <birgitte_sb at yahoo.com> wrote:
>  --- On Tue, 5/6/08, Anthony <wikimail at inbox.org> wrote:
>  > From: Anthony <wikimail at inbox.org>
> > Subject: Re: [Foundation-l] A new proposal regarding US chapters
>  > To: "Wikimedia Foundation Mailing List" <foundation-l at lists.wikimedia.org>
>  > Date: Tuesday, May 6, 2008, 2:34 PM
>
> > On Tue, May 6, 2008 at 1:54 PM, Jimmy Wales
>  > <jwales at wikia.com> wrote:>
>
> > >  and I can see an argument for
>  > >  each of them having their own legal organization
>  > (this seems better to
>  > >  me),
>  >
>  > It's certainly better.  But there's a lot of
>  > paperwork involved.
>
>  Is ther really that much less paperwork than what is required to have elections for a national board?  Is the risk of sharing liabilty between the responsible group in X and foolish group in Y worth it less paperwork for X?  What if some group wants to do the paperwork and only be responsible for the actions their group takes; will they be forced to join in the national scheme?
>
I don't really understand your first two questions, but I've been
thinking about your last one, and I think the only reasonable answer
is no.  If the local chapters feel they can better serve their members
by going it alone, they should do so.  Put another way, if the
benefits received by the local chapters don't exceed the membership
dues the national organization requires them to pay, they shouldn't
join.  This will help force the national organization to keep its
costs to a minimum, or else to provide a true value-add to justify
itself.

I'm also not dead-set that there has to be a national organization.
If it were just the paperwork that goes to the governments, I think
I'd recommend for my local organization to go it alone.  Of course,
I'm an expert in filling out government paperwork, that's pretty much
how I make a living, so I know I can do it.  On the other hand, a
national organization might also make it easier to deal with chap com.
 In the end, that might be the hardest paperwork to fill out.

So if chap com gets its act together, and makes it so basically the
only requirement for a chapter is to have 20 or so willing members
able to get together in one location and hold meetings, and agrees to
guide the group step by step through the rest of the process, then I
guess this whole proposal of a national chapter becomes unnecessary.