[Foundation-l] Re: Chapters, deductibility and donation profiles (was Wikimania 2006 - host city contest to open onSeptember 1st 20)

Wed Aug 17 08:50:38 UTC 2005

Tim Starling wrote:

> David Gerard wrote:
> 
>>There is the problem that people may donate to the local chapter
>>(everything but DB servers) *rather than* the Wikimedia Foundation in
>>Florida (DB servers). One would want to make sure that a country's
>>donations going to the chapter rather than the WMF would not leave a hole
>>in the budget.
> 
> 
> Well, my understanding was that in the last fundraising drive, the
> fundraising link on the German Wikipedia went to a Verein website, and
> that they collected some 9,777 euro. So people did indeed donate to a
> local chapter *rather than* the Wikimedia Foundation. And as far as I
> know, that money is still unspent.
> 
> Will the upcoming fundraising drive also direct German users to donate
> to the Verein, or will it direct donations to Florida? And if donations
> will be collected by the Verein, do they have a public budget or plan
> for spending that money?
> 
> -- Tim Starling

German users will very probably give to the Verein again, and if the 
french association is ready, french users will very probably give to the 
Wikimedia France as well.

And as it was hinted by several editors already, we can't just transfert 
money from one country to another.

This issue is one of the main reason we want to stimulate the group 
dynamics for people involved in Foundation or in chapters, so as
* to have a clear picture of the amount of money collected by each legal 
entity
* to have a clear picture of the budget of each entity, and naturally 
work toward both local spending (such as promotion in the country) and 
global spending solutions (such as financial participation to an event 
such as Wikimania)
* to have a good knowledge of legal possibilities for money transfer or 
spending for each country involved.
* to see how money can be gathered collectively and spend for global 
good (such as through a grant asked by several chapters at the same time)

This is precisely what we have been discussing at Wikimania and the 
reason for the chapter-l mailing list and a new wiki. Right now, 
coordination is very weak and communication insufficient. It would be 
the main role of the chapter coordinator to ensure a better 
communication occur, and ultimately to work on budget coordination with Mav.

You may see a description of the role here : 
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Chapter_co-ordinator

Since it has been mentionned recently that description of roles where 
not sufficient, please do not hesitate to complete or comment on that 
proposition.

ant