We had a big agenda for the board meeting this month, covering everything from completing the D7 upgrade to the DA Open Door Policy for staff. You are always welcome to peruse the notes or listen to the audio recording (or join us live!). For those of you who prefer your board updates in bite-size snacks, then this blog post is for you! Here are some of the highlights of the conversation:

DrupalCon Portland

DrupalCon Portland is on track and maybe even going to blow the doors down. I actually made this board meeting call from the Oregon Convention Center where I was able to review the space with Diana from Groundwell Marketing (our long time partner on the show) and do a lot of planning. We've got some great fun in store for this event and we're glad we've got so much space, because we may need every square foot of it. At the time of the meeting, we already had 1,100 tickets sold. As I write this blog post, we're up over 1,700. We're expecting big things for the Rose City! And if you have ideas, big or small, send them my way! Some other important reminders for the community:

• Registration is open for trainings and CxO. Both are selling at a record pace. Get your spots before they are gone!
• Hotel space is filling up fast. Book your room today!

Drupal Association Financials

Starting this month, the Drupal Association will publish a full set of financials for the Board. Once reviewed and approved by the board, we will make them available to the community. February (the last completed month) is now available, and the document includes an income statement, balance sheet, and statement of cash flows. We also put together a draft overview of how to read the financial statements. It's not complete yet, and we'll be adding to it as we receive feedback and questions. I also want to highlight a couple of notes we made verbally in the meeting:

• The budget to actual reporting on the income statement is pretty innaccurate right now, so don't be too alarmed when it looks like we're 127% behind on a revenue line item. We just got our budget approved in February (2 weeks after I started!), and needed to get it into the accounting system ASAP. Normally, our expenses and income go in cycles, mostly driven by the Cons. We didn't have time to evaluate those patterns and enter the budget into the system in a way that represents them. To save time, we just spread all income and expenses out evenly across the 12 months. We'll be rectifying that when we get a moment to breath, but we're going to see a high amount of variance until then. 
• It's also important to know that you won't find any Con revenue on the income statement until AFTER that Con has happened. Until we open the doors and start serving you coffee, we have to reimburse you, our sponsors, etc. if the Con gets cancelled. For that reason, this revenue is recorded on our balance sheet - and that's where you'll see the Portland DrupalCon revenue, in the liabilites section (because, again, we have to give it back if we don't produce the Con). In May, all this revenue will move to the income statement. So that looks funny too, and we'll work on ways to make that revenue easier to see.

Drupal 7 Upgrade (Redux)

Yup. We're gonna do that. Now that we've had a few months to reflect and plan, we're looking to move this project across the finish line. We're working on a more expansive blog post outling what happened and how things will be different next time. If you're curious enough to want a preview, you can check out the proposal that Drumm and tvn prepared for the board. The long and short of it is this: we are going into this project with very limited resources. We will have to very carefully scope the work for a very specific goal: a minimally viable product. While I know that nobody is more motivated than Drumm and tvn to make D.O the masterpiece the community deserves, we know that we can't finish this work unless we only focus on the truly critical issues. 

One other bit that we can promise you this time around: more updates. Tvn will serve as our communications czar, sharing regular updates with the board and community. 

Drupal Association Policies Approval

In executive session, the board reviewed the financial and staff policies that need to be reviewed and/or updated annually. Because the topic covers staffing, we had this discussion in executive session, but I can share that we reviewed the DA harrassment, discrimination, open door and whistle blower policies - all of which invite staff to speak to any manager or board member at any time when they need assistance resolving any of these issues at work. 

We also approved a contracting policy requiring the DA to seek bids for any contracts over $25,000 and prohibiting the splitting of contracts to avoid the bidding process. This is the first step toward a procurment policy that we would all like to have in place.

So that's what happened at the last DA meeting. Questions? You know where to find me!

Holly Ross, Executive Director, Drupal Association
skype: holly.ross.drupal / twitter: @drupalhross
phone: +1 503 213 3767 / e: holly@association.drupal.org

Flicker photo: charlesc