Draft purpose & governance model
Connections — draw people, groups, and organisations together across the town
Communication — a channel for residents to share news, events, and ideas
Collaboration — a place for community groups to store information, discuss, and work together
Governance — connect residents with their elected representatives and encourage participation
Repository — a trusted store of community information
Directory — discover events, groups, and local services
Discovery — surface hidden physical, human, and community resources people may not know exist
Showcase — highlight what Featherston has to offer visitors and new locals
Resilience — ensure people can access critical information and communicate through good times and bad
Support — a place where people in need can find help, connect with others, and access resources
Domain — we hold the featherston.co.nz domain name on behalf of the community
Web app — we host and manage a community information and collaboration platform
Data — we provide a secure place for community groups to store, manage, and share information
Trust — we build relationships with the community so people feel safe using the platform and contributing to it
Community-first — we exist to serve all of Featherston; no individual, group, or funder can capture or control us
Open — our decisions, finances, and processes are visible to all; anyone can see how we work and get involved
Resilient — built to last; the organisation survives the departure of any single person or group
Volunteer-led — run by people who choose what to do and how; governance exists to support volunteers, not direct them
Openness — information, money, decisions, and code are public by default
Anti-capture — no individual or funder may gain disproportionate influence
Participatory democracy — power belongs to those who show up and contribute
Sortition — random selection of certain roles prevents elections being won by wealth or name recognition
Sustainability — the organisation survives the departure of any single person
Community first — we serve all of Featherston, not any subset
A person who lives outside the Wairarapa but feels a connection to Featherston, or who contributes as a volunteer even though they live elsewhere.
A person who lives within the Featherston Ward. Voting Members get a vote whenever a vote is called. They are not required to be available for sortition to the Custodian Board.
A Voting Member who opts in to be eligible for sortition to the Custodian Board.
The doers
Volunteers lead the work, decide what gets built and published, and manage themselves. No one tells them what to do. All positive decisions belong to volunteers.
Guidelines — over time volunteers develop shared guidelines so that most day-to-day decisions don’t require a formal vote
Small groups — where ten or fewer volunteers are involved, decisions are made by consensus
Larger groups — where more than ten volunteers are involved, decisions require 80% agreement
Threshold reduction — the Custodian Board may lower the threshold to a simple majority, but only where there is clear evidence that genuine effort has been made to reach consensus
Energy — the success or failure of a community organisation rests on the energy among its volunteers
Wellbeing — volunteers thrive when they feel safe, appreciated, and part of a team with a strong shared purpose
Progress — a sense of momentum and excitement is what keeps people coming back
Autonomy — the people doing the mahi deserve to make the decisions about what gets done
Not unpaid workers — nothing kills volunteering faster than a committee that makes all decisions and treats volunteers as unpaid labour
Support — this organisation is built on volunteers who have genuine autonomy and feel genuinely supported
The guardians
Five Participant Members chosen by random lot. Their powers are strictly limited to the following.
Block — prevent volunteer actions that would breach the constitution
Suspend — remove volunteers who breach the constitution or who are disruptive
Protect — intervene if volunteers are about to put the organisation or committee members in legal jeopardy
Mediate — call in outside experts to resolve serious conflict among volunteers
Threshold — lower the volunteer consensus requirement to a simple majority, but only where genuine effort to reach consensus has clearly been made
No positive decisions — Custodians cannot direct volunteers or make calls on their behalf; if volunteers disagree on something, even which colour the website should be, Custodians cannot say "we choose blue"
No dual role — a Custodian cannot also be a volunteer; the conflict of interest is too great
Mediate, not decide — they can bring in outside help or remove someone causing serious disruption, but they cannot make the call themselves
No strings — we do not accept funding that comes with conditions on what we do or how we operate
No advertising — we do not accept money in exchange for advertising or promotional placement
Capped donations — individual and business donations are kept to a low maximum so that nobody can buy influence
Free to contribute — posting business listings, events, and community content is always free; we only accept donations, never fees
Even if the Society collapsed, nothing could be locked away.
Software — we build on open source platforms so that if we dissolve, or someone wants to take the data and start elsewhere, they can use the same tools we use
Content — we strongly encourage contributors to release public page content under an open licence, as Wikipedia does; small exceptions apply (e.g. a council logo that is copyright to the council)
Finances — bank balance, spending, and cash flow are published live; donations and sensitive business details may be kept anonymous but the figures are always public
Statistics — user numbers, visitor counts, and page traffic are published openly online
Download — anyone can download the entire site as a zip file: the open source software, all public data, and your own private contributions; you are never locked in — if you want to leave and start an alternative site, you can
Principle — if we cannot attract enough support to function properly, we close with dignity rather than limp along as a half-hearted site
People — we need at least 50 Participant Members available for sortition; less than 1% of the community
Money — we need to maintain a reasonable minimum bank balance
Warning — as either threshold is approached, a banner appears across the site alerting the community
Overlay — if either threshold is breached, a black semi-transparent overlay covers the entire site; the only thing visible is a link to sign up as a Participant Member, or a link to donate
Legal minimums — the Incorporated Societies Act requires at least 10 members and 3 committee members to form
Committee — 5 Custodian Board members, chosen by the founding members rather than by sortition this one time
Volunteers — ideally at least 5 active volunteers from day one
Roles — a treasurer, a secretary, and a technical admin are needed; these can be the same person
Outreach — people willing to go out and talk to businesses and organisations and get them signed up
Operations — people willing to do moderation, design, content, and site planning
Grace period — the dark mode thresholds do not apply in year one; it takes time to build a community
Funding — a benefactor is covering $1,000–$1,500 for hosting and incorporation fees so the society can get started
Sunset — if after one year we have not reached 50 Participant Members and a reasonable bank balance, we close down
Handover — the community needs to take collective ownership; if Richard retains an outsized role, this is not a real community organisation
Now — the time to start that transition is now
Volunteer not custodian — Richard’s skills belong in a volunteer role writing code; a custodian cannot also be a volunteer so he can’t be on the custodian board
Focus — his energy goes into building software that works for multiple towns and community groups, not just Featherston
Platform — featherston.co.nz is built on Kanecta, an open-source platform Richard has been developing for nearly two decades; building on it is what allowed the site to come together so quickly
Interoperability — Kanecta is what will allow Featherston to connect and share information with Carterton, Masterton, Martinborough, and other towns in the Wairarapa and across New Zealand
Social enterprise — Richard intends to grow Kanecta into a cooperative or social enterprise, based in Featherston but serving community groups and towns around the country and beyond
Hosting — groups without the technical skills to self-host can pay Kanecta to host for them; that income makes the platform more sustainable
No conflict — to avoid a conflict of interest, featherston.co.nz hosts itself; no hosting fees flow to Richard or Kanecta
Broader vision — the ambition is for Kanecta to be part of a wide cooperative organisation, in the spirit of the Mondragon cooperatives in Spain
Want to help build the cooperative enterprise as well?
Reach out.
featherston.co.nz — Community Hub skinned to look like a Featherston site; underneath it is the same platform any town or community group can use
Community Hub — built on Kanecta, so any group running it can share data with any other group on the same platform
Interoperability — because all sites share the same foundation, towns can share data with each other easily; other towns in the Wairarapa could have the same platform up and running quickly, and Carterton, Masterton, and Featherston could begin sharing data across the valley straight away
Developer motivation — software developers are far more motivated to work on a platform used by community groups across the country than to build a single small town’s website
Featherston’s advantage — Richard is an active volunteer in Featherston and will put his energy into the features this community needs
General governance information:
https://featherston.co.nz/governance
Draft constitution:
https://constitution.featherston.co.nz