[Foundation-l] Board resolutions (chapters)

[Andrew Whitworth]

On Tue, Jan 20, 2009 at 3:25 PM, Gerard Meijssen
<gerard.meijssen at gmail.com> wrote:
> When the right five friends come together, they do not need their dog to
> make a successful organisation. Five people are enough to make a bored, five
> people are enough to raise money. It takes dedication and a lot of effort.

5 people is not critical mass, and I cannot imagine that the chapcom
would approve a potential chapter that has only 5 members. 5 people
can do many wonderful things, but that does not make them a chapter.

> Ting ruled out the existence of an USA chapter because of the existence of
> the New York chapter. It is equally clear that the WMF organisation does not
> want to fulfill the role of an USA chapter. When Dan asks me and Anthere not
> to use the "sub-chapter" word, he is right in that the board names them a
> chapter, but the issue of the New York chapter having fewer abilities and
> responsibilities is conveniently swept under the carpet in this way.

This is all blatantly false. What "abilities" and "responsibilities"
are not available to WMNYC that our other national-level chapters
have? Besides the fact that the WMF itself is based on the USA and
therefore is more able to enter into business agreements with
companies here then in other countries, I see no limitation on this or
any other subnational chapter. Do not assume that this group is at any
disadvantage compared to our other national chapters. In fact, this
chapter is in BETTER shape then some of our national chapters are,
having already sponsored a number of outreach projects, creating
working relationships with other organizations, and soliciting
high-profile donations from museums and other content repositories. We
have national chapters that have not had as much activity in the last
year that WMNYC has had in the last two months.

> The prefix sub indicates that it is less then the norm. For me it is obvious
> that some great five or more people will make the NYC a success. What I want
> to learn is in what way the national concerns that I expect a functional
> chapter to take care off will be handled for the USA. This is the crucial
> bit of thinking, information that is missing. And as long as this is not
> clear, the NYC is a sub-par to me.

WMNYC does not need to impress you, and does not need your approval
Gerard. Their success will be measured in volunteers, donation
dollars, and media contributed to our projects. What "national
concerns" do you expect that they will not be able to address? Our
"sub-national" nomenclature indicates only that they are smaller in
size then the country that contains them, nothing more. If I called
them a "super-municipal chapter" or a "regional chapter", would your
opinion of them improve? If I called our current chapters "sub-global"
or "sub-continental", would that change your opinion of them too?

--Andrew Whitworth