[ncdnhc-discuss] Results of this mornings budget committee call.

[Harold J. Feld]

This morning the budget committee met to consider two agenda items.  1) 
The NCC response to the show cause order; and 2) discuss the DNSO's 
finances and budget for the next year.

Item (1) consumed the full meeting.  We did not discuss item (2) and 
hopefully will do so in the future.

Unfortunately, depsite the strenuous efforts of all concerned to 
schedule the meeting at a time when all memebrs of the budget committee 
could attend, several members could not join the call due to last-minute 
circumstances.  On the call were: Roger Cochetti (chair, gTLD), Marilyn 
Cade (BC), Chuck Gomes (gTLD), Harold Feld (NCC) and Elisabeth 
Portenueve (ccTLD).  Phillip Sheppard (BC) participated as an observer.

I discussed the funding difficulties faced by the NCC and the efforts of 
the NCC to satisfy the 2001 invoice.  Those on the call agreed that the 
NCC had, in fact, made strenuous efforts to satisfy the invoice.

I was asked to provide information on the following subjects:

1) How many members does the NCDHC have?

2) How many large v. small organizations?

3) Can we provide general profiles of the membership as compared with 
the global Non-commercial community: i.e., is the NCC representative of 
the global non-commercial community.

If the NCC is representative of the global population, this provides a 
stronger argument for waiving sanctions.  It was acknowledged the 
"representativeness" is a question for most consticuencies (the universe 
of gTLDs, ccTLDs, and registrars being relatively easy to define).

This raised the question, however, as to how to treat the NCC.  All 
agreed that it was unlikely that the basic problem of financing was 
unlikely to change.  It was pointed out that the NCC representatives had 
participated in the development of the policy and that two of the three 
NCC Representatives to the Names Council had both voted for the policy 
and had rejected an exemption for the NCC.

I responded that, as always, what seems good in theory may not work in 
practice.  While previous NCC representatives may have believed in good 
faith that NCC could raise the necessary funds and should pay on the 
same basis as other consticuencies, this has not worked out in practice. 
  Hopefully, the Names Council values the contribution of the NCC to 
take this reality into account and adjust the expectations in light of 
how the reality has emerged.

Several suggestions were made regarding the possibility of asking larger 
members of the NCC to subsidize the smaller memebrs.  I observed that 
even our larger members have very limited capacity, but that I would 
recommend to Adcom and the consticuency that we encourage a voluntary 
program whereby those who wish can make contributions to the NCC arrears.

We agreed that consideration of the broader concerns about NCC dues 
should be addressed at another time, and that we should decide what to 
do about the pending sanctions.  Because of the importance of this 
issue, we agreed to an online vote of the full membership rather than a 
formal vote.  I was asked to draft a motion for the Budget Committee to 
consider.  That motion will be voted on by June 7, so that a 
recommendation can be made to the NC by the next meeting (not tomorrow's 
meeting).  A non-binding straw vote was taken on the motion, which 
passed.  (I have drafted such a motion and cc:ed it to the NCC).

It was observed that the 2002 invoice would issue soon.  Any payments 
from NCC after the 2002 invoice issues will be credited to the 2002 
invoice, rather than the 2001 invoice.  For this reason, we differed 
discussion on whether the NC should "forgive" the NCC its 2000 and 2001 
arrears.

Roger also updated us on the ccTLD consticuency.  The ccTLD consticuency 
has not paid its invoice.  Nor did it respond to the show cause order. 
Accordingly, under the NC policy, the ccTLD voting privilege is 
automatically suspended, pending payment of arrears or action by the 
Names Council. [It will be recalled that the NC voted in April to hold 
the sanctions against the NCDHC in abeyance until the Budget Committee 
could consider our response to the show cause order and make a 
recommendation to the Names Council. Accordingly, the NCDHC willcontinue 
to vote on the Names Council until the Names Council takes action on the 
Budget Committee's recommendation.]

Harold Feld