Dear Community,
We hereby officially announce the upcoming elections for the next Board
of Directors of The Document Foundation.
As per § 7 II of our statues, [1] the Board's term lasts two years. The
current board started its duty on February 18, 2014. Therefore, the old
board remains in charge until the end of February 17, 2016, so the new
board will be in charge the day after that, which is February 18, 2016.
As per § 6 III, only members of the Board of Trustees of The Document
Foundation, as well as current members of any of its bodies, are
eligible to be elected into the Board of Directors, and the election is
overseen by the Membership Committee (§ 7 II).
The active electoral right is reserved to those who have been members of
the Board of Trustees before this announcement (§ 7 II).
§ 6 III also states that members of the Board of Directors or their
deputies may not be members of the Membership Committee and vice versa.
This means that current members of the Membership Committee are eligible
to be elected, but given that with the acceptance of their new role they
lose their current role in the MC, they would have to step down from the
Membership Committee the minute before accepting to become a member of
the Board of Directors.
There is one more notable limitation: Per § 8 IV of the statutes, a
maximum of 1/3 members of the Board of Directors is allowed to work on
an employment basis for the same company, organization, entities,
affiliates or subdivisions.
Nomination of candidates fulfilling the above requirements, as well as
self nomination is welcome. In total, at least seven Board of Directors
members are required, and given there are enough candidates, up to three
deputies can be elected (§ 7 II).
Re-election of current members of the Board of Directors is explicitly
permitted (§ 7 II).
Please send nominations and self-nominations via e-mail to
elections@documentfoundation.org (which reaches the Membership Committee
in private) and also (!) to board-discuss@documentfoundation.org (which
is a public mailing list).
We kindly ask nominees who would like to stand for elections to provide
a 75 words statement on their candidacy as continuous text (so no bullet
lists or multiple paragraphs). In addition, please also provide your
full name, e-mail address and your corporate affiliation, if any.
Discussions with the candidates and questions to them as well as
questions about the elections should take place on the public
board-discuss@documentfoundation.org mailing list. For details on how to
use the mailing list, see http://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/mailing-lists/
Eligible voters will receive further details via e-mail prior to the
start of elections, including a summary of the candidates, details on
how to access the voting system, and instructions on how to
independently verify the vote count. Please ensure the Membership
Committee has your recent and correct e-mail address on file. For
questions, you can reach the Membership Committee in private at
elections@documentfoundation.org
Following the time line set forth in § 7 II, requiring a 45 day advance
notice, we hereby announce the following time line for the elections:
1. 2015-10-19: announcement of the elections (this e-mail); and start of
the nomination phase
2. 2015-11-26, 24:00 CET/UTC+1: end of the nomination phase (one week
before the election starts, as per § 7 II)
3. 2015-12-04, 00:00 CET/UTC+1: official start of the elections (at
least 45 days after #1, as per § 7 II)
4. 2015-12-11, 24:00 CET/UTC+1: end of the elections
5. 2015-12-12: announcement of the preliminary results
6. 2015-12-14, 00:00 CET/UTC+1: start of the challenging phase
7. 2015-12-18, 24:00 CET/UTC+1: end of the challenging phase
8. afterwards: official announcement of the final results
Be advised that the newly elected Board of Directors will only be in
charge beginning from February 18, 2016. The current Board of Directors
will however include them in the decision making process, to easen up
the transition.
Challenges to this announcement with respect to the deadlines outlined
have to happen no later than seven (7) days after this announcement, via
e-mail to elections@documentfoundation.org (which reaches the Membership
Committee in private).
Challenges to the preliminary results of the election have to happen
until the deadline set forth above, via e-mail to
elections@documentfoundation.org (which reaches the Membership Committee
in private).
On behalf of the Membership Committee,
Cor Nouws
[1] http://www.documentfoundation.org/satzung.pdf (binding version) and
http://www.documentfoundation.org/statutes.pdf (non-binding translation)