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Re: [council] Travel funding



I'm sorry I could not attend today's meeting due to a conflict at the last moment.

Regarding travel funding, Avri asked that those who could not attend without support let her know. It would also be useful, both for Delhi and long-term, to know roughly how many councillors would not accept funding even if available. Based on previous experiences in many non-profit situations, there always seem to be some people who have access to employer funding and for personal or policy reasons, will continue to use this funding. If the number of such people is non-trivial, it will impact the budget required.

Alan

At 06/12/2007 01:53 PM, Avri Doria wrote:

Hi,

Thanks for this reply.

The council has decided to take a two track approach on this issue.

1. Ask for urgent  help in making plans to fund getting council
members to the New Delhi meeting within the current budget.  This
would include budget for many of the council members (up to 18) who
are not already covered by the travel budget.  The urgency of this
requestis reinforced by the fact tha this travel wil occur during the
Chinese new year, which means flights are scarce in Asia.

2. To continue discussing our request regarding long term funding for
council member travel support.  We will hold off on the letter to the
ICANN CEO at least until we have resolved this discussion in the
council.

We are definitely concerned with making sure that  ICANN's budget
includes funding for  the upcoming budget years.

Thank you,

a.


On 5 dec 2007, at 14.57, Denise Michel wrote:


Here is some information regarding travel funding and budgets to
inform your conversation about travel to the ICANN India meeting.
(My additional comments are at the end).

History ­ Initial requests for funding for some of the GNSO?s New
gTLD Committee intersessional meetings came from the Council Chair
and were treated on an ad-hoc basis. I provided funding on the
basis of economy travel for one rep per constituency, plus the
Chair and NomCom appointees. Due to the utility of these meetings,
and the expectation that more would be needed to complete this
work, I incorporated some travel funding in a revised Policy budget
I created for the latter part of FY 2006-2007 (ICANN?s fiscal year
runs from 1 July to 30 June).

Rationale ­ The rationale was that it was reasonable for
constituencies/employers to pay for attendance at the main ICANN
meeting (where there are usually business opportunities to discuss
amongst ICANN participants), but not for some of the policy- specific meetings held between the main ICANN meetings.

Current Budget ­ I included US$140,000 for two intersessional
meetings in the Policy budget for FY 2007 ­ 2008.  The Council has
not held an intersessional meeting since 1 July 2007.

India Travel ­  It is estimated that airfare for 21 Council members
for this meeting would be US$147,000.  Cost for hotel/per diem for
21 Council members for this meeting would be US$205,800.

I would be happy to discuss using the intersessional travel funding
to support Council members? travel to the India ICANN meeting (as a
one-off decision) (letters to the CEO not required).  If the
Council would like to request funding for Council members to
receive support to attend all ICANN formal meetings, then this will
need to be included in the budget for the FY 2008 ­ 2009.  I will
be requesting GNSO input for this budget cycle shortly.  As noted,
travel funding also has been discussed in the context of ?GNSO
Improvements? under consideration by the Board Governance Committee.

Regards,
Denise

Denise Michel
ICANN VP, Policy Development
denise.michel@xxxxxxxxx






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