Expunge Assist Team Charter

Version 1 - October 2024. View the living document and sign here..

1. Overview

Project Name: Expunge Assist Expunge Assist is a free digital tool specifically designed to aid Californians with arrest and conviction histories in clearing their criminal records.

Organization: Hack for LA

Mission Statement: Hack for LA brings together civic-minded volunteers to build digital products, programs and services with community partners and local government to address issues in our LA region.

Objectives:

As a team, we aim to have:

• Efficient and effective collaboration within and across teams
• Shared, mutual goals and prioritizations
• Refined, accessible processes to ensure continuity between existing, incoming, and outgoing members
• Work that is fully documented, easily accessible and replicable
• Public-facing information that reflects a proper level of expertise

We support a collaborative framework characterized by mutual trust, reflection, and open/early dialog. We encourage clear ownership of issues to avoid ambiguity.

2. Expectations

2a. General

Charter: To adhere to this charter as well as the Hack for LA standards laid out in your onboarding (time commitment, undivided attention, commitment to documentation).

Participation: Attend weekly meetings consistently, contribute to meeting discussions, and update your team on your progress of issues you’re working on asynchronously. As a volunteer on a project, you are expected to commit at least 6 hours per week to your meetings, assignments and documentation. If you miss two weeks in a row of meetings without communication, your team will assume you are offboarding and begin that process.

Communication: Respond to Slack messages and GitHub update requests in a timely manner.

• Commitment to Each Other:

• For team members, communicate with your Lead and PM
• For Lead, communicate with your team members and your PM
• For PM, communicate with your Lead, other PMs, the Org (Bonnie)
• For all, if absent from team / core meetings more than 2 times a month reconsider participation (Options include: stay – with modifications, offboard – rejoin when time commitments allow, join another HfLA project, offboard from project but still attend the weekly Community of Practice meetings)

Accountability: Complete assigned tasks by deadlines and keep your team informed of progress & challenges.

Capacity Strain:

• Volunteers: If you begin to struggle with your workload for Expunge Assist and/or are absent from team/ core meetings more than twice a month, please talk to your PM or Lead. They will be able to assist you with workload management suggestions, and/ or help you figure out what a better fit might be.

• PMs/ Leads: If you find you are struggling with your workload for Expunge Assist in your leadership role and/or are absent from team/ core meetings more than twice a month, consider the following options:

• recruiting a replacement, and moving to a volunteer role
• offboarding from the project (with a month heads up)

Every team member’s contributions and insights are invaluable and we appreciate all that you bring to the team. Stepping back can also create opportunities for others to shine and share their talents.

2b. Offboarding Expectations

When a team member transitions off the project, we strive to ensure a smooth offboarding process that ensures knowledge transfer. The following guidelines outline our expectations to facilitate a seamless transition and maintain project continuity:

• Advance Notice: Team members planning to leave the project should provide at least one month’s notice whenever possible. This allows sufficient time to transition responsibilities, ensure knowledge transfer, and minimize disruption to the team’s workflow.
• Knowledge Transfer: Before departing, the team member will work closely with their team to document and transfer key responsibilities. This includes:

• Identifying a successor or supporting the process of transferring responsibilities to another team member.
• Ensuring all relevant documentation in project management tools (GitHub, etc.) is up to date.
• Providing clear, detailed instructions for any ongoing tasks or projects.

3. Roles & Responsibilities

Current team roster can be viewed here in our Wiki.

We support a collaborative framework characterized by mutual trust, reflection, and open/early dialog. We encourage clear ownership of issues to avoid ambiguity.

UX Research

To provide support to the dev, content, design teams in 3 ways: 1) building expertise in expungement laws in California as the core knowledge of problem domain, 2) maintain collaborative process with Design, Content, Dev that supports product decisions and ensures best practices in user research in civic tech, 3) evaluate product to provide feedback and ensure product quality.

UX Design

The UX Design team is focused on understanding the needs and values of our users, to create a usable, meaningful and accessible product. Design is responsible for Expunge Assist website’s UX aspects, including usability, visual design and accessibility. Maintains/updates figma files and collaborates with dev/research/content to create more intuitive experiences.

Content Design

Designs and maintains clear, concise, and useful content across the website that supports the user’s goals. Creates, audits, and maintains guidelines for content, voice and tone, information architecture, terminology, and copy/text.

Dev

Dev is responsible for building and rigorously testing the product to ensure quality and reliability. We define technical requirements upfront, working closely with cross-functional teams to create a cohesive, user-focused solution that aligns with project goals.

Product Managers

Product managers are responsible for defining the product vision, developing roadmaps, and prioritizing tasks. Goals include aligning stakeholder, team, and user needs, and driving milestone achievement.

4. Communication Plan

a. Purpose To establish clear guidelines for communication within the team, ensuring efficient collaboration, transparency, and timely updates across all platforms.

b. Communication Tools and Their Uses

Overview:

• GitHub: The primary tool used for communications, documentation, project management, task tracking, and code collaboration. All development work, issue tracking, and documentation should be managed through GitHub. GitHub includes a Wiki section that is regularly updated.
• Slack: A supporting tool for day-to-day communication. Different channels should be used for specific topics (e.g., #general, #development, #design, #productmanagement). Volunteers are encouraged to engage regularly and use threads to keep discussions organized.
• Zoom: Used for formal meetings, such as project kick-offs, retrospectives, and major decision-making discussions. Agendas should be prepared in advance, and meetings should be recorded and summarized.
• Google Suite: For collaborative document creation, data sharing, and file storage. All important project documents should be stored in a shared Google Drive accessible to the entire team.
• Figma: For design, whiteboard use, etc
• Figjam

Details:

GitHub

• Primary Use: The main project management tool, code repository, and project documentation space
• Communication Type: Asynchronous formal updates on project progress, issue tracking, pull requests, technical discussions, Wikipedia
• Best Practices:
• Document everything.

• Wiki pages are free and can make the difference between working on the product and reinventing the wheel. This is a complex project. Help newcomers start to contribute faster by documenting your learnings.
• Comment on issues with updates on decisions made regarding that issue, time estimates, and resources used.

• If you’re unsure about changing something, ask.
• Response Time Expectations: Weekly update once assigned issue

Slack

• Primary Use: Quick, information communication, real-time collaboration, and Huddles
• Communication Type: Daily updates, quick questions, brainstorming, and informal check-ins
• Best Practices:
• Use specific channels for your team or project to keep discussions organized
• Utilize Huddles for quick voice or video chats to resolve issues without scheduling formal meetings
• Response Time Expectations: Within 24- 48 hours

Zoom

• Primary Use: Formal, scheduled weekly & monthly meetings
• Communication Type: Scheduled meetings for in-depth discussions, check-ins, decision-making, and stakeholder engagement
• Best Practices:
• Meetings should have a clear agenda circulated ahead of time and at the meeting
• Meeting Agenda templates are all available in GitHub
• Team members should switch off creating the Meeting Agenda every week so all have experience and understanding of how to
• Typically, the person who created the Meeting Agenda that week will also facilitate
• Another person will take notes during the meeting, and add them to the Meeting Agenda afterward. The note-taker should also vary from week to week, so all team members gain that experience

Google Suite (Google Docs, Sheets, Slides, etc.)

• Primary Use: Calendar, collaborative document creation, shared spreadsheets, presentation development, file storage.
• Communication Type: Collaboration on documents, data sharing, and presentations.

Figma

• Primary Use: Design and content workspace, archive of design decisions, hand off wireframes to Developers
• Communication Type: Wireframe annotations and comments, issue organization + archive,
• Best Practices:
• Annotations and comments should be made prior to dev/content review
• Issues should be labeled using
• Figjam

5. Conflict Resolution

Direct Communication: Volunteers should first attempt to resolve conflicts through direct, respectful communication. Mediation: If the issue persists, a neutral team member or the Project or Program Manager may mediate the discussion. Please reach out to Project Manager Maria via Slack to arrange. Escalation: Unresolved conflicts may be escalated to Hack for LA leadership for final resolution.

6. Meeting Schedule

As a member of the Expunge Assist team, you are committing to attending weekly meetings consistently, contributing to meeting discussions, and updating your team on your progress of issues you’re working on asynchronously. As a volunteer on a project, you are expected to commit at least 6 hours per week to your meetings, assignments and documentation. If you miss two weeks in a row of meetings without communication, your team will assume you are offboarding and begin that process

View the Meeting Schedule here

7. FAQs & Roadmapping

Q: Who can create an issue in GitHub? A: Any team member.

Q: Who is responsible for ensuring added issues are not doubled from older ones, and that they get labeled and moved along GitHub correctly? A: PMs, then Leads. Ideally at least weekly

Q: What are our priorities? A: Right now, building a product that can be pitched to potential community partners. Internally as a team, we are working to provide more of a roadmap and structure to align on how to get there most effectively - stay tuned!

8. Reviews and Updates

Regular Reviews: The charter will be reviewed every six months - April and October.

Updates: Any changes to the charter will be discussed with the team and approved by consensus before implementation.

This charter serves as a living document that guides the Expunge Assist project, ensuring that all volunteers work together effectively toward the common goal of making expungement accessible to all.