Board Management
This section documents how the DTA board operates: the tools we use to coordinate, the processes we follow to stay accountable, and the patterns we’ve found work for a volunteer board running a downtown business league.
It’s written for three audiences at once:
- DTA board members — find what’s available, where to plug in, what the next thing on your plate looks like.
- The public — see how we operate. We don’t keep our methods secret; transparency is part of our value to downtown.
- Other non-profit boards — borrow what works. Most small non-profits run on volunteer time and email threads; we’ve built lightweight automation that scales beyond that without becoming a startup.
What’s in this section
Section titled “What’s in this section”| Page | What it covers |
|---|---|
| Communications | How messages reach the board (email, contact form, /board on Discord) and how we reply |
| Meetings | Our cadence, the Narrative Map briefing pattern, recap process |
| Listening | Surveys, issue reports, district channels, between-meeting feedback loops |
| Membership | Tiers, automation, the Stripe → Discord → email pipeline |
| Tools | The full tech stack — what we use, what we built, what costs what |
| Committees | How working groups form, charter, and stay accountable |
A short philosophy
Section titled “A short philosophy”We’re a volunteer board. Time is the binding constraint, not money or technology. So we optimize for:
- One place to look — board mail (whether email, web form, or Discord) all lands in one Discord channel
- Reply where you are — replies can go out from Discord without opening a separate app
- Automate the routing — humans don’t sort mail, the bot does
- Don’t fight the user — a member’s chosen Discord nickname is theirs; a contact form respects their stated email
- System of record stays canonical — Discord is fast and conversational; FAYDTA’s database is the source of truth that survives the next board member rotation
These choices show up across every page in this section.
A note on what we share publicly
Section titled “A note on what we share publicly”You’ll see we describe our tools and processes openly. We do not document:
- Member personal data (emails, addresses, payment information)
- Internal board deliberations on personnel or pending negotiations
- API keys, passwords, or credentials of any kind
- Specific resident or business complaints by name
If you’re an external board reading this — the patterns translate. Most of what makes our setup useful is in the process choices, not the specific software. The Discord-as-conversation / web-as-record-of-truth split, the “blank-only” nickname enrichment rule, the Polish-with-AI before sending step — those work in Slack, in Notion, in WhatsApp Groups, anywhere.