Nakaner's Diary

Sustainable Travel Expenses Resolution – Request for Support

Posted by Nakaner on 26 October 2020 in English.

As written on the OSMF-Talk mailing list, I am proposing a resolution for the upcoming Annual General Meeting of the OSM Foundation on 12 December 2020. In order to get the proposal up for voting, I need support by at least 5 % of all members, i.e. about 80 members.

You can find the text and rationale in the OSMF-Talk archives.

If you want to support this proposal, please comment this diary entry with the openstreetmap.org account which is tied to your Foundation membership. If your membership record does not contain your username (or you are not sure), please send an email to osmf-agm20-sustainable@michreichert.de with your user name. Please use the email you use for your Foundation membership.

I will email the list of all supporters to the board after 4 November 2020 (UTC).

Supporting the proposal in this step does not mean that you will or have to vote in favour of it.

I would like to ask you to use the comment section of this diary entry only for the purpose outline above. Please use the OSMF-Talk mailing list to comment on the content of proposal instead.

Discussion

Comment from abeverley on 26 October 2020 at 10:24

abeverley

Comment from YjM on 26 October 2020 at 10:37

Support.

Comment from scai on 26 October 2020 at 10:39

scai

Comment from Mateusz Konieczny on 26 October 2020 at 10:43

Note that in this proposal (as stated) paying far more money for car rental, long distance taxi or vastly more expensive train is considered as a “reasonable alternative”.

In case of funding travel expense it would be necessary to select vastly more expensive alternative if it exists and matches this requirements?

So in case where there is either flight costing 100 euro and long distance taxi for 20 000 euro (with bus/train being unavailable) it would be mandatory to pay for taxi.

And in case where there is option

(a) flight for 100 euro, flight takes 3 hours in total (including airport security theater) (b) train tickets for 500 euro, travel takes 9 hours with multiple changes

then it would be forbidden to select option a?

Comment from Galbinus on 26 October 2020 at 11:25

support

Comment from skifans on 26 October 2020 at 11:30

support

Comment from UNGSC-Jrachi on 26 October 2020 at 11:44

I like the idea and I support it.

Comment from Andy Allan on 26 October 2020 at 12:39

I support putting this to the AGM.

Comment from Stereo on 26 October 2020 at 12:44

This strikes me as unreasonable, and I won’t support it.

We’re already doing this whenever possible. For the (cancelled) F2F planned in London in March, every European board member had booked a ticket on the Eurostar to get there, and all except one had a train ticket to go back.

You’re also talking about the free time of volunteers. Board and OWG members invest a lot of their time for the OSMF; asking people to spend an extra 12 unpaid hours, plus, since you’re only considering travel time in your proposal, any extra time needed to wait for the transportation, is unreasonable.

You’re also not considering the cost and the carbon impact of this. A one-hour flight on a full Dash-8 will cost and emit less than a seven-hour trip alone in a rented car. Not being able to fly could also add an extra hotel night.

As an example, my trip to Cambridge for the treasurer handover in February would probably have been covered. The flight cost 65 EUR, plus £40 for the taxi from the airport because weather conditions shut the train line from Stansted. Taking the train would have cost the OSMF around £300 more, plus the extra hotel night. I would also have had to spend two nights in Cambridge instead of one, and spent two working days instead of two evenings on travel.

Comment from Gregory Williams on 26 October 2020 at 14:06

I support this idea.

Comment from jonsger on 26 October 2020 at 14:13

support

Comment from Lejun on 26 October 2020 at 17:04

Count me in.

Comment from Skinfaxi on 26 October 2020 at 22:27

Betty importend..i support it.

Comment from okilimu on 26 October 2020 at 23:00

I support this.

@Guillaume: you should not take the actual flight cost, it doesn’t reflect the complete costs.

Comment from WegefanHB on 27 October 2020 at 00:09

I support putting this to the AGM.

Comment from drolbr on 27 October 2020 at 06:14

Support

Comment from Discostu36 on 27 October 2020 at 13:43

Support

Comment from mikelmaron on 27 October 2020 at 17:57

A more flexible framework will be more effective. There’s too many factors to consider to set up specific rules like this. It’s too much operational detail for an AGM vote. Rather, I’d like to see membership have OSMF make a commitment to reduce carbon, request a thorough audit be undertaken, and come up with a range of specific operational changes.

I do the carbon audit at Mapbox. Based on that I’d expect that OSMF computing resources are several orders of magnitude more contribution to emissions. How much exactly would require some work. Options to reduce by selecting more sustainable power sources for hosting, or other efforts, might take some time. But worth looking at.

As is, the proposal is not likely to have a significant impact on OSMF’s carbon emissions, and just add additional burden in a small number of situations. The numbers seem arbitrary based on a subjective assessment of convenience trade-off, not actual emission reductions. We already choose a F2F site to reduce overall travel, that has typically meant in Europe (the only place where realistically the choice between fight and train or bus would be realistic). In the vast majority of cases, Board members have preferred non air travel. Intercontinental flights dwarf the potential emissions savings. Who knows if we’ll resume F2F after COVID-19, or if Screen 2 Screen will become the norm; it’s been nearly as effective in my opinion – depending on the amount of focus brought to the event.

Comment from Tallguy on 29 October 2020 at 00:49

I support this being considered at the AGM, but would not agree its approval in its current state - I think Mikel, and others, have made valid comments here.