Closed patcon closed 4 years ago
Here's my proposal for how to break this down: (this should perhaps be in Loomio. was thinking could migrate if contentious -- messages seem easy to miss in there, and overly private.)
Sounds like a good start? Anyone have feedback or other ideas for approach? cc @hyphacoop/member-workers
As someone reading through others' by-laws, thinking that a changelog would be nice.
Yes, we'll have a git history (eventually), but it would be a neat precedent to have it in the official by-laws themselves for when it's printed/shared as a doc.
Feedback from Matt at Fourth Pig:
@patcon sent email:
Member Benefits
The Board may create a reserve fund before any distribution of surplus arising from the business of the co-operative in each fiscal year is made. Unless the surplus exceeds $12,000 in one fiscal year, no patronage returns will be allocated, credited or paid to members or non-members.
Not sure how to square this bit with not-for-profit status and your articles. Can you clarify? :)
Matt reply:
In terms of your question - it is referencing the surplus fund - we are allowed to have a contingency (reserve) fund in order to properly operate the business. We recently put this in to mark that we want to make sure that funds continue to go into the contingency fund. So with the money we get in we a) pay our account receivables b) put money in the reserve fund c) pay off any debts d) provide patronage returns.
Surprised that patronage returns are possible for a not-for-profit worker co-op, so still something I need to understand better
From https://github.com/hyphacoop/organizing/issues/70#issuecomment-538146143
We go this advice from our accountant:
document in constitution that money is going into separate bank account and have it all specified in by-laws. it will be part of the reserve.
Adding myself to this to keep it on my radar, not meant as a claim of exclusivity
Confirming we are :tada: ready to draft :tada:
@dcwalk mentioned in 2020-01-29
gov wg notes:
pc: what's in scope of bylaws? [...]
dc: good chapters in "ours to hack and own" platform coop book
https://worldpece.org/sites/default/files/artifacts/media/pdf/ourstohackandown.pdf
"Chapter 15: Three Essential Building Blocks for Your Platform Cooperative", written by Janelle Orsi, known as the "sharing lawyer", including sharing bylaws.
The list of things I would build into cooperative bylaws is actually much longer than the above...
She apparently spent quite a bit of time drafting the Loconomic Co-op bylaws (which we'd found already, but maybe an extra reason to lean on them 🙂)
@benhylau summary of the Janelle Orsi section: Three elements to encode securely into the legal structures of platform cooperatives:
This happened! Followed up from AGM in #307
Shared Description
:speaking_head: Loomio: https://loomio.hypha.coop/d/5akByK9O/agm-preparations-by-laws-etc-
:date: Due date: by first AGM :dart: Success criteria: drafted and reviewed bylaws to take into AGM.
To Do