Fwd: Expiry of 4 DMB members on the 12th of May - election needed?

[Thomas Ward]

*Notice: This response is with my Community Council hat on.*

On 5/9/22 18:12, Dan Streetman wrote:
> On Mon, May 9, 2022 at 4:22 PM Robie Basak<robie.basak at ubuntu.com>  wrote:
>> On Fri, May 06, 2022 at 03:41:59PM -0400, Thomas Ward wrote:
>>> The Developer Membership Board members (myself included) expire from the DMB
>>> in under six days - is an election required for new DMB members, or will the
>>> TB simply extend our current expirations until an election can be held?
>> Thanks Thomas for raising this.
>>
>> We need to run another election. We can arrange the details at our next
>> DMB meeting I guess. From the TB end, I assume it's fine for the DMB
>> just to go ahead and run their own election again unless there is any
>> objection?
>>
>> In the meantime, I (acting for the TB) can just extend the current
>> DMB memberships for as has been done in the past - unless there is any
>> objection?
> Well, maybe it's just me, but it seems like there is at least an
> appearance of conflict of interest, as you're on both the TB and DMB?
What exactly is the conflict of interest you see?  I reviewed the 
current procedures which are available in public documentation - the 
only things that Robie would do here are:
  1. send out the request for nominations (which has been done in the 
past by him or others),
  2. gather nominations on the private list for DMB,
  3. punch the nominations into CIVS, and then
  4. press the buttons to fire off the CIVS election - there's no way 
for them to influence the election as a result that way because at that 
point its out of their hands.

Alternatively, what if it were me running the election?  I sit on the 
DMB, but I also sit on the Community Council which is the highest 
community governance body in the Ubuntu community.  Would you have a 
conflict of interest if I ran the election from the administrative 
perspective?  And if so, given that the process is *administrative* and 
not able to be influenced by whomever runs the election, what *is* the 
conflict of interest?  You say there is one, but don't describe it, 
which means that at the core you cannot support your argument that there 
is a CoI.

> So I guess that yes, I do object to both questions, and I also suggest
> that someone from the TB who isn't also on the DMB should handle both
> of these questions - both deciding if it's appropriate to extend the
> expired DMB member's terms (and performing the action) as well as
> actually executing the DMB election. I certainly don't feel it is
> appropriate for a DMB candidate to also be the administrator of the
> election.
See above about executing the election.  There is precedent for people 
who are members of the board or council itself to run the election 
themselves in the cases where such rights are delegated to the board or 
team (see any of the Flavor councils/boards/teams as examples), partly 
because the administrative bits are not open to influence by whomever 
runs.  Ultimately, the vote is a CIVS vote and when that vote happens it 
is no longer under anybody who adminstrates the elections' purview to 
influence the outcome.  One of the major reasons we use CIVS voting.

> I also should point out that if the TB wants to continue to 'own' the
> DMB membership, the TB might want to add something to its calendar so
> the next election happens in a timely manner? Or, alternately, the TB
> might want to simply delegate membership decisions to the DMB itself,
> and then the DMB might want to have some kind of 'administrator' who
> would be responsible for (and keep track of) these kind of
> administrative issues.
As stated above, there is precedent for teams running their own 
elections regardless of who is on the team or whatever because the 
administration process is straightforward for elections.  Further, as it 
was stated here, the TB seems to have no problem with the DMB running 
its own elections - as a result, in your argument, nobody would be able 
to run the election due to time constraints, personal availability, etc. 
which is the main problem - there's people on councils and groups who 
sit behind the scenes voting on policy and such, and then there's the 
people who action based on those votes - it's why many of the CC actions 
get my public responses on them because I'm the "doer" who gets stuff 
done at the CC level, but the actions represent the CC's ultimate decisions.

As well, the TB/DMB relationship has been the way it's been **for 
years** without arguments here, and the arguments you are making are 
counter to the function of leadership in the Community.

The DMB *must* be staffed in order to allow developer applications to be 
processed.  It is NOT unheard of for a governing team to expand its 
current members terms just long enough for there to be an election run, 
in order to keep continuity of processes going.  Which is where the 
"extend membership" part comes in - and there's precedent for THIS as 
well - CC has been asked by lower councils it oversees to temporarily 
extend the membership to allow an election to run and then restaff 
according to the election results.  This has been done in many cases - 
DMB, TB, other membership boards, etc. - and there is extremely strong 
precedent already set for this to be the case. *To that end*, the TB is 
within their rights as 'oversight' for DMB to extend DMB members' 
permissions long enough to let an election run *and* to allow continuity 
of operations until the election completes.  It is my interpretation as 
a member of the Community Council of the preexisting precedent that, 
whether there's objection to Robie doing this or not, it is the TB's 
purview and right to extend DMB members' terms just long enough for an 
election to be held to allow continuity of operations and governance.  
Robie is a member of the TB.  The fact that Robie is actioning this on 
behalf of the TB to permit continuity of operations and governance is 
inconsequential to the fact that the DMB must be staffed and properly 
provided permissions to allow continuity of operations for developer 
membership and upload applications.

Once the election vote is held, DMB members will be restaffed according 
to the vote.  That includes myself, even though I sit on the highest 
community governance council.  If the vote ends up not in my favor, 
that's the voters choice and I accept it.  If the vote ends up keeping 
me on the DMB, then so be it as well, that's not a conflict of interest 
of my roles, that's the Community's decision, not the decision or 
actions of any one person or board/council member.


Thomas
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