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PSF Meeting Minutes for Feb. 24, 2021

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The Python Software Foundation
Minutes of a Regular Meeting of the Board of Directors

February 24, 2021

A regular meeting of the Python Software Foundation ("PSF") Board of Directors was held over Group Conference Call via phone and Internet Relay Chat/Slack beginning at 15:00 UTC (GMT/Zulu), on February 24, 2021. Betsy Waliszewski took notes/minutes with the assistance of Ewa Jodlowska.

All votes are reported in the form "Y-N-A" (in favor-Y‚opposed-N‚abstentions-A; e.g. "5-1-2" means "5 in favor, 1 opposed, and 2 abstentions").

1   Attendance

The following members of the Board of Directors (10 of 13) were present at the meeting: Lorena Mesa, Jannis Leidel, Jeff Triplett, Christopher Neugebauer, Thomas Wouters, Dustin Ingram, Kushal Das, Anna Ossowski, Marlene Mhangami, and Ewa Jodlowska.

Betsy Waliszewski (Event Planner and Administrator), Jackie Augustine (PyCon Manager), Phyllis Dobbs (Controller), Joe Carey (Accounting Manager), Ee W. Durbin III were also in attendance.

2   Resolutions

Minutes from prior meeting January 27, 2021:

RESOLVED, that the Python Software Foundation approve the minutes at https://mail.python.org/archives/list/psf-important@python.org/thread/KICKE7VJ5XLSSBK2LFF6ZL62IZZPLYEW/ as representing a true and accurate record of the January 27, 2021 meeting.

Approved 9-0-1

3   Board and Staff Monthly Reports for February 2021

3.1   Ewa Jodlowska

  • PyCon

    • Streamlined the process for creating deadline lists for sponsors based on custom benefits (and used Python!;)
    • Created grids for tracking social media benefits for Sponsor Coordinator
    • Wrapped up PyCon’s mentorship program. Assisted with proposal mentoring for two mentees
    • Attended PyCon Committee meeting
    • Continue to attend sponsor calls and help create metrics
    • Continue to review sponsor communications and handle sponsor communications each Friday.
    • Continue to track benefits with Event Manager and work on updating python.org.

  • PSF

    • Attended a staff goal planning meeting for the first half of 2021.
    • Worked with Google on announcements for Visionary sponsorship.
    • Reviewed Python Developer survey and working with Sponsor Coordinator on announcements.
    • Drafting grant letter to Bloomberg with Director of Infrastructure
    • Had a call with Google’s OSO about consultation opportunity. Discussed with Chairperson and brought up to Exec. Committee. Currently working on getting additional proposals for comparisons.
    • Held two rounds of interviews for Director of Development and have made a final selection. Reached out to references for 5 people and gathered examples of past work. Going through the final steps now.
    • Attended Funding WG call.
    • Attended regular fiscal sponsorship calls with Finance Controller
    • Attended a contract training session with the entire staff
    • Attended regular Code of Conduct WG meetings and helped take notes.
    • Created an overview of Q1 & Q2 for the Fundraising Committee for review/input.
    • Attended two finance committee meetings.
    • Continue to attend weekly Steering Council meetings and help take notes. I continue to review necessary Discourse discussions. Currently working on job description for Developer in residence.
    • Continue to publish PSF newsletter every other month
    • Monthly personal goal review
    • Monthly meeting with chairperson
    • Continue to moderate several mailing lists
    • Continue to help review contracts, documents and other drafts written by staff
    • Continue to log the fellow member nominations, run quarterly votes, update Fellows page on pydotorg, update CiviCRM with new Fellow members, notify new members, write blogs for new members
    • Continue to answer general PSF email
    • Continue to participate in board discussions
    • Continue to review time sheets
    • Continue to meet with Sponsorship Coordinator, Event Manager, Finance Controller, and Director of Infrastructure regularly and regular communications via Slack. Continue to support the staff in any way possible.

3.2   Jackie Augustine

PyCon

  • Final review and decision for PyCon virtual platform
  • finalize details for contract with virtual platform company
  • participated in zoom meetings with sponsors and explaining of the sponsorship process
  • Assisted in detailing all deadlines and deliverables for sponsor communications
  • worked on draft schedule overview for PyCon
  • worked with committees to begin review process for talks, charlas, tutorials, posters
  • scheduled and worked with planning committees for 6 PyCon Summits
  • began planning and creation of volunteer roles and worked with committee on launching to sign up process
  • continued work with Director of Infrastructure on adding to us.pycon.org/2021 as new components of PyCon are developed
  • worked with AV team on components and proposal for support during PyCon
  • worked with designer for Pycon t-shirts and stickers
  • worked with vendor to complete storefront for PyCon t-shirt purchases
  • Attended the all staff goal meeting and planned for my 2021 6month goals
  • Attended PyCon Committee meeting and planned for next 2
  • Planned and attended meetings for PyLadies Auction
  • Attended D&I Workgroup meeting
  • Weekly team calls
  • Weekly one on one calls with team members

3.3   Betsy Waliszewski

  • PyCon
    • Attended weekly meeting for meeting planners
    • Attended monthly meeting with PyCon committee
    • Conducted additional follow up meetings with PyCon sponsors to discuss 2021 participation
    • Helped with research on virtual platforms
    • Participated in bi-monthly PyLadies Auction calls
  • PSF
    • Logged in contributor agreements
    • Continue to respond to general PSF email
    • Weekly 1:1 with Executive Director
    • Continued routine tasks of keeping records up-to-date
    • Managed community mailing list subscriptions
    • Managed voting memberships self-certifications - logged in new contributing and managing members
    • Continued taking notes at board meetings, posting minutes and approved resolutions
    • Continued to help with our social media presence through Sprout Social
    • Helped out with grant notifications
    • Participated in staff goal-setting meeting for 2021
    • Attended a staff contract training session
    • Working on scheduling social media for Python Developer survey results.
  • PSF Sponsorship
    • Managed new sponsor applications
    • Worked on PSF and Python anniversary infographics
    • Worked on updates to annual impact report
    • Finalized designs for sponsor badges
    • Promoted PSF launch day sponsors on social media
    • Participated in 7 sponsor calls
  • Fundraising
    • Worked on 2021 membership drive that begins on March 1, 2021
    • Worked on outreach to grant recipients to solicit stories and pictures to use during our membership drive

3.4   Ee W. Durbin, III

  • PyCon US 2021 web work including registration launch, CFP, financial aid, and support to Jackie
  • Python.org sponsorship tooling
  • PyPI incident and security response due to spam attacks and "dependency confusion" publicity
  • Discussions on PyPI/Packaging WG funding as well as role development for project/community manager

3.6   Laura Graves

  • Ongoing accounts payable responsibilities
  • 2021 Budget work
  • Issued 1099’s for work completed in 2020
  • Presented Charitable Solicitation Registration project to the Finance Committee
  • Reviewed potential fiscal sponsors for eligibility in joining the PSF
  • Prepared grants report for the 2020 annual report
  • Helped draft and review financial aid pages before publishing for PyCon 2021
  • Created grant graphs for 2020 Annual Impact Report
  • Started supporting schedules for 2020 990
  • Reviewed handbook and existing PSF policies for completeness, and suggested updates and additions

3.7   Joe Carey

No report submitted.

3.8   Lorena Mesa

  • PSF - Code of Conduct WG - attended bi-weekly meetings and contributed to discussions.
  • PSF - Grants WG - participated in grants reviews on mailing list.
  • PSF - Finance Committee - attended quarterly meeting.
  • PSF - Chair duties - met with Ewa to prep February agenda as well as promote agenda items within the Board for discussion.
  • PSF - Investigation relative to PSF future planning
  • PyLadies - Assisting in planning for remote PyLadies auction for PyCon 2021
  • PyLadies - Organizing PyLadies' International Women's Day events (https://iwd.pyladies.com)

3.9   Kushal Das

No report submitted

3.10   Jannis Leidel

No report submitted

3.11   Katie McLaughlin

  • PSF - Participated in email, slack, and chat discussions
  • PyCascades 2021 - Attendee and volunteer
  • PyConAU 2021 - team forming, initial planning stages (yet to announce)

3.12   Marlene Mhangami

  • PSF - Participated in email and Slack discussions
  • PSF - Company sponsorship discussions
  • D&I WG - Following up on action items after the quarterly meeting
  • D&I WG - Brainstorming ideas to help with the membership drive
  • D&I WG - Slack and email discussions
  • Project Funding WG - Participated in the monthly meeting
  • PyCon Africa - Continued discussions about this years conference and organisation structre
  • PyCascades - Attended and spoke in a panel discussion on community organising

3.13   Dustin Ingram

  • PSF: Announcement of Google as PSF visionary sponsor
  • PSF: Finance Committee - reviewed 2021 Budget and Charitable Solicitation Registration
  • PSF: Sponsors - Discussion with NVidia about packaging-related work and funding
  • PSF: Outreach - Spoke at PyCascades as a PSF board member
  • D&I WG: Participated in re-occurring meeting
  • Project Funding WG: Continued work to connect funding with projects
  • Project Funding WG: Discussed upcoming directed sponsorship projects
  • PyPA: Continued maintenance and maintainership of projects including PyPI
  • PyPA: Ongoing discussion on paid PyPI feature development
  • PyPA: Ongoing discussion about PyPA as fiscal sponsoree
  • PyPA: Discussions about Tidelift and GitHub Sponsors

3.14   Jeff Triplett

  • PSF - Code of Conduct WG - bi-weekly meetings and participated in email, Slack, and chat discussions.
  • PSF - Finance Committee - Budget 2021 Meeting. Participated in email, Slack, and chat discussions.
  • PSF - Finance Committee - January meeting, agenda review, and participated in email, Slack, and chat discussions.
  • PSF - Board - Participated in email, Slack, and chat discussions.
  • PSF - PyCon US Committee meeting and discussions.
  • DEFNA - Participated in email, Slack, and chat discussions.
  • DSF - I participated in email, dms, chat, and Twitter discussions. Advised the board on a few recent topics after they reached out.
  • Community - Attended PyCascades. It was great.
  • Outreach - Co-hosted monthly Python organizers hangout in February.
  • Outreach - Had a few more members reach out to help with job leads.
  • Life - Impacted by the extreme weather so I'm a bit behind on everything.

3.15   Anna Ossowska

  • Participated in PSF-Board Slack + email discussions
  • Participated in PyCon and Finance Committee meetings
  • Reviewed PSF budget + finance documents
  • Planned PyLadies London meetup for March
  • Worked on Community Leadership Council documentation

3.16   Thomas Wouters

  • PSF - Participated in PyCon US committee, board mailing list, Fellows committee.
  • Steering Council - Participated in weekly SC meetings, PEP review, and the discussion around Debian package of Python.

3.17   Christopher Neugebauer

  • PSF: Participated in PyCon US committee
  • PSF: Participated in board discussions and meetings
  • PyCon AU: Reviewed proposal for 2021 online conference
  • Spoke to Esther Shein about Codes of Conduct, and made reference to the PSF's work

3.18   Nina Zakharenko

No report submitted

4   Work Group Reports

4.1   Sponsors

Reviewed and voted on new application from Blue Array SEO.

4.2   Marketing

Launching Q1 membership drive on March 1, 2021.

4.3   Jobs

Nothing new to report at this time.

4.4   Trademarks

We had or responded to 23 requests or enquiries concerning mostly logo usage. A small portion was concerning the word "Python" itself. Of note, one request was about using the word "micropython" in a community website, and another item of note is we've worked and given a list of items for evidence to Van, for the trademark application in the Japan case.

4.5   Fellows

New fellows for Q4 2020 were announced.

4.6   Packaging

Ewa has been working with the group on setting up a process for adding benefits for incoming sponsors.

4.7   Infrastructure

Nothing new to report.

4.8   Scientific Python

The work group extended the deadline to its call for project development proposals (https://pyfound.blogspot.com/2020/12/psf-scientific-working-group-announces.html), so that it could be advertised more widely. The WG is currently reviewing applications.

4.9   Funding Work Group

  • Discussion on sponsorship and PSF role in funding smaller projects like Futurecoder
  • Discussion about member mailing lists and access
  • GitHub repo and updating it
  • Attaining larger sponsorship

4.10   Diversity & Inclusion Work Group

  • Working on a video to promote the survey
  • Working on a database of international community organisers
  • Discussions about demographic data collection
  • Discussion about how to help with the membership drive

6   Votes Approved by Working Groups

6.1   Grants

RESOLVED, that the Python Software Foundation Grants Work Group grant $2500 USD to the PyCon Belarus conference happening virtually March 13, 2021

Approved 6-0-0, February 15, 2021

RESOLVED, that the Python Software Foundation Grants Work Group grant $1000 USD to the "Multi-Week Virtual Course: Python Game Development" for professional services and technology to analyze student learning outcomes. The virtual online learning will be taking place throughout 2021.

Approved 6-0-0, February 15, 2021

6.2   Sponsors

RESOLVED, that the Python Software Foundation Sponsor Working Group approve the sponsor application from Blue Array SEO at the Associate Level.

Approved 5-0-0, February 23, 2021

9   Discussions

  • The Code of Conduct transparency report was discussed. To be continued via email.
  • The PSF Director Term Cap limits and company limits discussed - to be continued via email.
  • Discussed if the PSF wants to stay the same, grow, decrease. The PSF is investigating options for a consultant to help guide the PSF in what our future growth should look like.
  • Discussed the option to "appoint" directors with specialized skills to support the transition to a global organization. To be continued via email.

10   Meeting Adjournment

The meeting was adjourned at 23:01 UTC (GMT/Zulu).