After Three Years, AlmaLinux Is Having an Election

Here’s some preliminary information about AlmaLinux OS Foundation’s upcoming board election. We’ll keep you up-to-date as we learn more.

It seems to be election week here at FOSS Force. No sooner had I hit the “publish” button on yesterday’s article about Fedora’s upcoming board of directors election than a message shows up in my inbox about plans that AlmaLinux OS Foundation is making for its next board election.

The folks at AlmaLinux — which started life a few years back as a CentOS replacement but which has morphed into much more than that — hasn’t had a board election since their very first election three years ago. That pretty much automatically makes it time to have another election, considering that AlmaLinux board members are elected to three year terms.

In the upcoming election, six of the eight board seats will be up for a vote. The two seats that aren’t were created in 2023, and so won’t be up for re-election until next year.

The Planned Election Timeline

In a blog post on Thursday, AlmaLinux OS Foundation’s chairperson, benny Vasquez, published a reasonably detailed look at the upcoming election that included an outline of the schedule for the upcoming election — with the caveat that none of the plans are etched into stone yet, and won’t be until the board approves them at the next board meeting on May 15. The reason for announcing it now is that according to the proposed schedule, anyone considering a run will need to apply by the end of May, or within about two weeks after the schedule is approved.

As is typical for nonprofit organizations, membership is a requirement for voting in AlmaLinux board elections. If you’re not already a member, in order to vote in the upcoming election you must apply to join by the end of July. After that, voting will take place during the month of August, and the results will be announced sometime in September.

“The opening of the election will be announced on the blog,” Vasquez said, “and all members will get an email asking them to cast their ballot.”

Becoming an AlmaLinux OS Foundation Member

Individual membership in the foundation are free and do not require applicants to have contributed code to the project. As a matter of fact, the foundation’s online membership application form offers three presumably co-equal categories of membership:

Contributor Member: open to those who are making meaningful contributions to the AlmaLinux OS ecosystem. Renews annually subject to confirmation of continuing eligibility.
Alumnus Member: open to those who have made contributions in the past that remain significant to the AlmaLinux OS ecosystem. Renews biannually subject to confirmation of continuing eligibility.
User Member: open to those who make use of AlmaLinux regularly.

“We want the people who care about the future of AlmaLinux to be able to have a voice in the future of AlmaLinux, whether or not they are developers,” said Vasquez.

In addition to individual memberships, AlmaLinux also offers memberships to sponsors, that is companies or organizations that contribute funding or resources to the project. There are also Mirror Sponsor Members, for individuals or entities that provide mirrors for content distribution.

Wanna Run?

In her blog — and in a separate video that covers a lot of the same material — Vasquez offered her thoughts not only on why someone might want to make a run to serve on AlmaLinux’s board, but also goes into what’s expected of a board member once elected.