You might have already seen the announcement that board elections are coming soon. Self-nomination for candidates opens in less than two weeks. There are four seats up for re-election. We’d like to let you know that Arnalie and me will not be available for another term.
That means that at least two new board members are needed for the next term. Please consider standing.
Kind regards
Sarah
My term is also expiring and I will (almost certainly) will not submit my candidature for reelection.
If anyone is interested about any aspect of being board member - feel free to ask me!
I am also preparing a presentation about typical tasks, time investment etc etc that I will present on STOTMEU and STOTM and can link also here.
Happy to also answer any questions about the OSMF / being a board member 
Can I participate the new member nomination?
Any natural person may be elected to become a board member, provided that:
[1] Normal members provide their full residential address and can vote on all issues. Their residential address may be disclosed to other members.
[2] Associate members provide just their country of residence - which may also be disclosed to other members - and can vote - but not on all issues. Additionally, they cannot be board candidates.
If you want to find out the type of your OpenStreetMap Foundation membership (normal or associate), please check the most recent approval/renewal membership email or email the volunteers of the Membership Working Group at membership@osmfoundation.org from the email account associated with your OSM Foundation membership. Please see the OSM wiki regarding changing your membership type.
Oh, and if anyone is curious why I am probably not running: 2 year term for me means over 600 hours of time of volunteer work for OSMF. This is in addition to also hobby mapping time, developing OSM software as a hobby and software development of StreetComplete that was externally supported and funded some OSMF-related expenses.
Right now I need to spend on some areas, and sadly as result it seems that I run out of time budget needed to be an effective board member in one more term.
My current plan is to likely take at least one year break and consider elections after nearest one.
There is still tiny possibility that I will arrange things a bit differently, but it is not really likely to happen.
In short: I am in a good enough situation to spend hundreds of hours per year on fun/hobby/entertainment/volunteering/improving world… But 600+ hours commitment is a quite large one and not fitting into my time budget right now.
As a former Board member, I’m very happy to talk with anyone about what the OSMF needs, and what it looks like as a Board member. A quick note on time commitment, I’d say that on a regular basis, I never got close to the number of hours Mateusz has been putting in. It’s certainly up to individual Board members as well. It’s important to focus in your work and identify clearly areas you can contribute to, so that your time is well spent.
I suspect that you may be underestimating it (unless you actually measured it). I am logging time spend on some of my projects and it consistently turned out, at least in my case, that I was spending more time than I expected or estimated.
(or maybe I actually put significantly more time - but you can be also useful board member with lower time costs, especially if someone is more efficient)
I think perhaps it would be helpful if the current board members could describe some of the day to day tasks they take on as a member of the OSMF board – separately from the other OSM-related projects you might have going on.
Disclaimer: all of the following represents my personal view.
Craig has given pretty detailed descriptions in the secretary’s report of the day-to-day tasks that land on the board’s table. Have a look at the board meeting minutes. Here are the link to just the last three months:
They give you a good idea about the daily work.
As a board member, you should be able to put aside 3-4 hours a week to just follow the board discussions, participate in important decisions and help with some of the daily tasks. Then there are two board meetings a month for which you need to be able to block a regular slot in your calendar. Because the board is very diverse in terms of time zones, the meetings are most likely to take place around noon-4pm UTC.
I would also strongly recommend that you lightly follow this forum to have an idea what is going in the community. No need to read every tagging discussion in detail but at least skim the new topics and follow the ones more closely that concern the OSMF. Add another 1-2 hours a week.
On top of that, you are free to donate as much time as you wish to board work. There is certainly enough to do. Have a look at the strategic plan to get an idea about the “big” tasks, you could take a lead on. Personally, I’d say the move to the EU is still on top of the list. I haven’t been able to get this as far as I would have wished, so somebody needs to take over this project. There is also still lots to do in the areas of funding and community engagement. Somebody with experience in bookkeeping would be an enormous help. If you are good at motivating people, then getting more people engaged in the working groups is a great way to help out. That’s just some ideas. I’m sure that others in this forum can immediately tell you about other priorities. 
My take on board work is that it is much less about implementing specific ideas. It is more about providing the right environment that these goals can be implemented by others. It’s about bringing together the people with the same idea, about making sure they have the funding, information and tools they need, about having an open ear and provide support when they are stuck and about just leaving them alone when things go well. You should like talking and listening to people because that’s what you will be doing a lot.
You can now nominate yourself as a board candidate for the 2024 election of the OSM Foundation. Please first check the eligibility criteria and add your details to the candidates’ table on the OSM wiki.
Deadline: 13 August 2024, 23:59:59 UTC
At least four of the seven board seats are available. Board members are volunteers and typically serve for two years until their seat is up for re-election.
You can find information on what the board is/is not, rules, responsibilities and personal views of current and past board members here.
Any person may be elected to become a board member, provided that:
(1) Normal members provide their full residential address and can vote on all issues. Their residential address may be disclosed to other members.
(2) The General Meeting is scheduled to take place on 19 October 2024.
(3) Associate members provide just their country of residence and can vote - but not on all issues. More information here.
If you want to find out the type of your membership (Normal or Associate), please check the most recent approval/renewal membership email before emailing the volunteers of the Membership Working Group at membership at osmfoundation.org from the email address which is associated with your OSMF membership.
You can change your OSMF membership from associate to normal membership by emailing the volunteers of the Membership Working Group Membership Working Group - OpenStreetMap Foundation.
This is expected to be the official election campaign process. We won’t restrict members to continue to talk on our members’ mailing list nor will we restrict candidates to continue discussions, but we don’t
encourage them to do so. The official answers and questions thereof should be what voters use to judge.
For more information regarding the 2024 board election and the 18th Annual General Meeting please see the following links: