I think we need to go one step further. Specifically, what I mean is that we should agree on "services" that the Hive wants to keep and maintain available at the space. We would need to keep a list of these, probably on the wiki. An example of a "Service" would be a desoldering and soldering station. Once it is agreed on that this is a service that the Hive will have, the COO/other officers have discretionary spending up to a limit($250?) in order to keep this service operational. Larger expenses (say, the laser cutter catches fire and melts) would still need membership discussion and approval. Spending can be accomplished by either a PO request to the treasurer or a reimbursement request to the treasurer, of course along with documentation about the service being repaired.
I've been spending a lot of my own/my company money on hive stuff lately. I'm not angry about this, but it's not going to continue at current spending levels forever. There needs to be ***streamlined*** procedures for keeping services that we deem to be important functioning. The hive is no longer scraping by to pay its bills. Let's try to turn the corner and maintain the site's usefulness so that we can attract more people interested in getting stuff done instead of frustrating people with a bunch of half working equipment and poorly stocked supplies.
This model would work for things that fall under the CTO's jurisdiction as well as the COO. For example, the hive is almost out of CAT5/CAT6 UTP cable. There is ONE jack end for terminating connections left that I can find. In order to run any more drops we're going to need more jacks and (soon) more cable. I'll probably just end up buying what we need and donating it (next fiscal year) but it would still be nice to have a procedure in place for me to get reimbursed for these "routine" expenses.
Having "available network connections" as a service that we offer at the hive and implementing my suggestion would cover this, as well as the soldering station issues Paul has highlighted.
Discuss.
Dave B.