Budget 2025 planning

Hello,

unfortunately, dealing with issues from the past keeps this board very busy, so some items are later than everyone hoped for. For the next board call, which due to the public holiday takes place on Tuesday (!) next week, one of the main items to discuss finally is the budget.

General process

Recently, a proposal was made to hire developers in order to grow and share independent inhouse competence in various areas. There is no concrete plan so far, further details will be discussed in the call.

We will provide a spreadsheet with further budget details after the call, but in the meantime, I would like to give you an overview of the budgetting situation, based on the preliminary annual closing for 2024.

Ideally, we can come to an agreement how the budget will look like during next week’s board call. Afterwards, I will share it with the accountant, so they can double check. Only then we will do the final approval for the official/formal budget, but I suggest we agree that we spent based a “final draft” already next week.

The finalization of the formal document is a tedious task that involves a lot of A3 printouts, two screens, comparing every dot and comma, and it will cost me likely two days, plus translation on top, so that’s nothing that can happen just en passant.

Numbers overview

As of January 1, we have 3.125.615,06 € in the bank. Out of this 50.000,00 € are the capital stock and CAN NOT be spent, and 1.244.814,12 € are the free reserves which DO NOT HAVE TO be spent, but COULD BE spent.

However, given the current situation TDF is in, I suggest to not touch the free reserves for now. The previous board assumed half a million € in emergency reserves already… Then, we have some additional income from this year’s donations that we COULD spend, but it lowers our next year’s budget.

I am sad we are hindered in planning some of these funds in because of the problematic situation. The irony is that some like to say TDF wants to sit on a pile of cash in the bank, which is utter nonsense, but the reality is that now we are forced to be conservative…

Factoring in some pending payments as of January 1, in total we MUST PLAN IN 1.752.018,24 € to be spent for 2025.

Recurring costs

Recurring costs are structured like the past years:

  • Accounting, payroll and auditor
  • Legal advice
  • Running cost & discretionary spending
  • Trainings
  • Infrastructure
  • LibOCon & FOSDEM
  • Community projects
  • Marketing budget

Projects from the past

There is also a variety of projects from the past, for each of which TDF needs to decide whether to still pursue it and whether it’s still realistic in the near future. The projects are:

  • MC request: Improvements on the Membership Committee tooling
  • 2-4% budget to FLOSS software as devprojects or support
  • MC request: TDF welcome kit for the members
  • Update & translate LibreLogo manual, complete LibreLogo unit tests
  • [MC] Carbon compensation
  • 10% project budget for members
  • Hardware for members
  • BZ release funding
  • [MC] Training on the reform of foundation law changes incl. BoD
  • trademark filings
  • Research and development of collaborative editing features based on open standards
  • LibreTranslate Improvement of localizations and translations for worldwide involvement of volunteers
  • In-person strategy workshop 2024-2026
  • Legal consultations
  • Outreachy
  • Integrating Hetzner cloud to Jenkins
  • Graphic design work for great visuals for website, socials, blog posts and marketing
  • Bug Bounty Program
  • Aptos font replacement
  • LibreOffice SBOM (Software Bill of Materials) – CRA conformance

For some of them it’s unclear whether they would stay, for others it’s clear (e.g. the MC has a need for further work on their tooling), for others it’s unlikely (e.g. the strategy workshop is unlikely to happen in-person separately from LibOCon).

I’ve e-mailed board, membership committee and team to get feedback on the projects, so we can update the spreadsheet.

New projects

We also have a variety of proposals for new projects to be built for 2025 and beyond. Currently, the list reads:

  • Extensions for local/remote access of Open Source LLMs/SLMs
  • LATAM Conference
  • JA community + LibreOffice Asia Conference
  • Developer hirings
  • TDF hosted open source LLM
  • five tenders plus costs for external experts
  • two legal items
  • two HR items
  • LibreOffice Roadshow

Some of the expenses could be merged into the marketing or community budget.

Based on my estimate which projects are likely to happen and which ones aren’t, for entirely new projects, we would have 345.512,10 €. However, this sum is just my estimate and has not been discussed - it heavily depends on feedback on the past projects, so take it with a grain of salt.

In any case, we should create new projects wisely, ideally with things doable or at least things that can be started this year. I suggest we only approve projects that have an owner (a person in charge of them), and a concrete budget.

I hope that provides an update on our budgetting situation, and that we can soon share more details and a close-to-final spreadsheet.

Florian

Hi @floeff & all,

good to see the donation income growth & improving cash buffers! Is there space for community discussion, on the various budget items?

If so: the CRA preparation appears urgent, in part because right now, the standardization around it takes shape.

Beyond that: referencing ‘past issues’ as an explanation for the ongoing stasis begins to feel a bit odd, after almost 3/4th of the current board term is over. Perhaps you and the remaining board could accept the help & offers for solutions that were extended? Or avoid losing quite a number of motivated & capable directors along the way (who could have helped shouldering the work)?

Both points seem to fall entirely within the responsibility of the current board, just as effectively planning around fixed dates of the year (annual report, taxes & audit) appears to be a responsibility of an executive director.

Best, Thorsten

So, did the current BoD increase the reserves to this amount? It’s not a round number. Can you elaborate a bit, or post a link (perhaps by editing the initial post)?

I don’t believe we necessarily have to plan to spend the entire sum in 2025. We could decide on some actions or activities which take several years, and would be funded from this sum, without relying on future income (that might go to the “regular” expenses + tenders as in previous years). I’m not saying that’s necessarily better, just that this is an option.

Hello Thorsten,

good to see the donation income growth & improving cash buffers! Is there space for community discussion, on the various budget items?

Yes, there certainly is. The next board call will be (due to the public holiday on Monday) on Tuesday, June 10, at 1800 Berlin time (1600 UTC). We plan to have a close-to-final budget after the call, ready to be sent to the accountant to work on the final version.

If so: the CRA preparation appears urgent, in part because right now, the standardization around it takes shape.

I’ve been talking to Paolo about this, who will likely drive this from the board’s side. I would assume the CRA budget proposal stays in as of today indeed. Happy to talk about it in the call next week if there’s further details, or in this thread, of course.

Beyond that: referencing ‘past issues’ as an explanation for the ongoing stasis begins to feel a bit odd, after almost 3/4th of the current board term is over.

What keeps the current board busy is the period from 2022 on, during which you were the chairperson of the board. I honestly don’t think it’s appropriate to criticize this board for their work on fixing past issues. What this board is dealing with goes back as late as to the very last days of the previous board, e.g. with an invoice that is literally dated to the very second day this board was in charge and forwarded by a former board member three days later.

Perhaps you and the remaining board could accept the help & offers for solutions that were extended?

You seem to suggest this board (and surprisingly me, who is not even a voting member, so you are pointing at the wrong person here) is refusing your proposals. That is not true, and for the details, I think it is much more sensible to discuss it in private conversation with the board, and not on a public mailing list.

Or avoid losing quite a number of motivated & capable directors along the way (who could have helped shouldering the work)?

From what I recall, one board member stepped down for very personal, non LibreOffice-realated reasons. I will not draw them into a narrative here. Another board member seems to have had reasons regarding the issues TDF is facing. I will not go into details of what was shared with me privately here.

Both points seem to fall entirely within the responsibility of the current board

I don’t think it is appropriate to point fingers at the current board. Blaming them does them very wrong. They cannot use use their board term for creating and shaping new and exciting things, because they have to deal with issues from the past, created not by them.

just as effectively planning around fixed dates of the year (annual report, taxes & audit) appears to be a responsibility of an executive director.

I am glad that this is the area that is repeatedly confirmed by everyone including auditors to be in excellent shape at TDF and without any problems, indeed. It’s also noteworthy that it was not the executive director who produced an invalid budget that didn’t even fulfil formal requirements, nor did he vote one only on the very last day of the spending year…

The free reserves, so to speak, are “budget-transparent”. As we don’t have to plan them in, they are not included in the budget. We only plan in what we have to spend. The free reserves are used as reserves indeed.

The original post that had “491,000.00 € emergency spending and reserves” is at [DECISION] - Approve 2023 annual budget and reserves

Yes, indeed. Technically, recurring costs, like salaries, infrastructure hosting, insurances, membership fees etc. can only be planned for one year. Projects can be built for a longer time, so at least new projects can also go beyond 2025.

If the previous board hadn’t left us so many problems to deal with, perhaps we’d be further on now.

A tiny bit of humbleness would be good.

2 Likes

Hi @mikesaunders ,

Perhaps. None of the massive challenges the last board was facing, were created by it. All of it were due to actions from years before. Still, I don’t recall anyone from that term constantly blaming previous boards for our travails.

And it’s not that some current board members where not intimately aware of what challenges they were facing, even ahead of the election. Still, promises were made - but not a single one of them has been achieved yet. So when you talk about humbleness, and what serving in a leadership role means after making such promises - perhaps some self-reflection is in order? :wink:

Cheers, Thorsten

Hi @thb ,

It is truly outrageous to see you publicly pointing fingers at the current Board, when the majority of the problems we are now dealing with are a direct consequence of the disastrous decisions of the past boards you were a part of.

During the time you were chair, the board not only ignored fundamental legal advice, but also insisted on running a non-profit foundation at your own discretion. — completely disregarding the legal obligations imposed by German law.

The result was the paralysis of tender processes for LibreOffice development and the triggering of a serious institutional crisis that compromised the stability and credibility of The Document Foundation.

To now speak of “stagnation” or suggest that “offers of help were declined” is not only dishonest — it is a cynical attempt to rewrite history and wash your hands of the chaos you yourself caused.

This all is an embarrassment to the LibreOffice community that, twice, placed its trust in you through democratic vote. And beyond that, what happened at TDF is a disservice to the Free and Open Source Software movement, which should be grounded in responsibility, ethics, and transparency — values clearly absent during the past boards term.

The current Board is not failing, my dear. This Board is working hard, seriously and lawfully, to correct the mistakes you left behind. If there is delay or overload, it is because we are rebuilding from the wreckage of an incompetent, authoritarian, and unlawful period of time.

The current Board deserves respect.

Enough is enough!

Best,

–
Eliane Domingos, Chair of the Board of Directors
The Document Foundation, Winterfeldtstraße 52, 10781 Berlin, DE
Gemeinnßtzige rechtsfähige Stiftung des bßrgerlichen Rechts
Legal details: Imprint | LibreOffice - Free and private office suite - Based on OpenOffice - Compatible with Microsoft

1 Like

Talk is cheap, @elianedomingos - which one of your many promises have you kept?

Cheers, Thorsten

Hi Thorsten,

I’m pleased to see that the new owner of allotropia acted swiftly on some of the issues you created and that you could have fixed a long time ago.

True that many other issues could have been solved 3 years ago but now that you are not in a decision making position on these matters I’m confident that we’ll be able to finally make progress quite quickly.

oops. indeed … https://www.collaboraonline.com/blog/collabora-allotropia-merge/

(less and less potential tenders :expressionless: )

I think this thread makes it very obvious where the issues are and why
solving them takes so long, despite an enormous effort from the current
board and more than 100.000 € in legal fees during the last years which
could have been much better used for our software and community.

To me it feels this board is hindered from doing the good things they
intended, by having to deal with massive problems from the past. While
some of them might have been known before the elections, just recently,
during its current term, this board discovered many more issues from the
2022-2024 period, one dating back to the second
day in office. Several issues were created during this 2022-2024 period,
and not only years before. We‘ve yet to see what other things happened
this board is not yet aware of, amongst other items because Paolo and
Emiliano have been wrongfully excluded from discussions and also the
executive director has been informed of some things just after the fact.

One of the great achievements of this board is the publication of many
minutes and decisions from the past, which were wrongfully not published
before. They should help everyone to understand the situation even
better.

I don’t know what the reason for this discussion is. However, I can
assure everyone that all here at TDF are working hard to fix the
problems from the past and provide a welcoming, warm, inviting
environment for all contributors, be they volunteer or corporate. Board,
team and membership committee go above and beyond, and mails as we see
here will not demotivate, distract or scare them in doing the right
thing for TDF.

So let me thank everyone for all your work, dedication and enthusiasm,
and I am sorry if you experience undue attacks and blame. As there is no
actual argument made, I will focus on the budget and the annual report
now.

When I have stepped down from the BoD, I have also decided to refrain from expressing my thoughts about BoD activities (otherwise, I shouldn’t have stepped down, if I had time and energies to express my thoughts). I have started to read this thread because I am interested in the budget, because there are items related to marketing and community where I am involved either because I am handling the expense on behalf of the BoD (like the visual agencies, or the organization of the events) or because I have an oversight function (as in the case of marketing and community budgets).

I didn’t expect the discussion to re-start the finger pointing exercise we have seen for the last N years (I refuse to write a number, as to me, it seems forever). Every person who has been involved in the BoD, or in other formal or informal bodies such as the MC, the team and the ESC, since the project’s foundation, has done good and bad things - i.e. taken good and bad decisions - as every other human being in the planet (and possibly in the universe).

During these N years, everyone has been accused of doing or having done bad things. While this is true, as we have all done bad things (either in the form of bad decisions or in the form of bad communication), no one likes to be accused in public especially when the accusation is not related to the discussion as in the case of this thread about the budget.

So, please remember that we have all been treated unfairly, which means that if we are looking for some kind of revenge we can probably continue with the finger pointing strategy for another N years, without getting anywhere.

Can we get back to a civilized discussion about the budget, focusing on the opportunity represented by the budget in terms of growth? I am sure that there are different opinions worth being heard, as they can contribute to put together a more adequate budget for the project. Collective intelligence has the potential to improve any discussion, but also to destroy any project if not managed properly.

Please choose the first option, and forget the second one.

The Cyber Resilience Act (CRA) is already on the table, together with the Software Bill of Material (SBOM), thanks to Paolo.

Sophie

My understanding is that Andras is doing a chunk of work[1] on SBOM for
Collabora, currently and is wrestling nobly with the quite considerable
swathe of detail there :slight_smile: It would probably be helpful to have some
feedback from Cloph too perhaps on how best to integrate that.

HTH,

	Michael.

[1] - https://gerrit.libreoffice.org/c/core/+/183178