General Assembly 

The General Assembly or Annual General Meeting (AGM) is the yearly meeting where members of the association come together to discuss matters related to the organisation and perform their duties such as electing board members and discharge the existing board.

AGM 2023

Note the General Assembly 2023 has been completed.

• Time: The next general assembly of KDE e.V. takes place on Saturday 9th of September at 1 pm UTC
• Place: The general assembly will be held online and in-person at KDE e.V.'s office in Berlin (extremely limited capacity; please register with the board in advance if you want to be there in person).
• Agenda: See the agenda for what is planned to happen at the general assembly.

Attending the AGM

All members of KDE e.V. are invited to attend the general assembly. The AGM can be held in person, in hybrid form, or entirely online. The general assembly of 2023 voted that future AGMs can be called as virtual meetings where the members taking part must execute their other membership rights via means of electronic communication without being present at the meeting location. A hybrid or online AGM does not preclude participating by proxy as described below.

If you are not able to participate in the general assembly in person you can ask another member to act as proxy for you to execute your voting right. This is regulated by section 6.6 of the articles of association of the KDE e.V. Fill out the proxy form, sign it, and make sure that it is available to the chairperson of the general assembly on the day of the assembly. Each active member can act as proxy for up to two other active members.

Please print out the proxy form, fill it in, then scan it. This should then be emailed to your proxy and the board.

If you do not execute your voting rights personally or through a proxy for two consecutive general assemblies your membership status will be changed from active to extraordinary, according to section 4.2 of the articles of association. Extraordinary and supporting members have the right to attend the general assembly, but they have no voting rights.

The general assembly is usually held at Akademy. Don't miss the opportunity to be part of this exciting event.

Activities at the AGM

The AGM is the highest decision-making organ of the association. The agenda of the AGM is published before the meeting, with all of the scheduled discussions and decisions spelled out. There are a number of standard elements in the agenda, which are mandated by law:

• Election of a chairperson to run the meeting,
• Appointment of a notes-taker to produce the protocol (minutes) of the meeting,
• Report of the board describing the activities of the association,
• Report of the treasurer describing the financial state of the association,
• Report of the auditors of accounting describing the financial audit of the association,
• Vote on relief of the board.

The financial side of the meeting is an important one. The board is responsible for the financial outcome of the association each year between the AGMs. This responsibility is a burden on the board.

The auditors of accounting check the accounting -- the income and expenses of the association, how spending is justified, etc. -- and deliver a report stating what they find. Hopefully, the association is carefully managed and the books are complete, detailed, and fair. The spending satisfies the statutes of the association.

When the accounting is satisfactory, the auditors of accounting recommend to relieve the board of the burden of responsibility: the association's members as a whole decide that the responsibility now rests with the association, not with the people who are on the board.

A vote to relieve the board says "yes, the board has behaved responsibly."

Protocol of the AGM

The official notes of the AGM are taken by the AGM-note-taker and deposited (in German) with KDE e.V. and the authorities. Some years have English translations. You can find the notes of past AGMs on the reports page.