[NCUC-DISCUSS] Call for volunteers to comment on the 1st Finance Committee Operational Procedures draft (OP)

Tue Jul 17 14:27:47 CEST 2018

Dear Steph, Ayden and other friends,

First thanks for making out time to comment on this draft operating
procedures for NCSG-Finance Committee.

With regards to your concerns I wish to state for instance that bulk of the
OP actually radiated mainly from the assignment contained in the NCSG
charter and we cannot do the OP halfway.

Be that as it may, FC has mandate to source and leverage opportunities for
new fundings both inside and outside ICANN and cannot make success of that
without mainstreaming the ICANN community to unravel these, liaise and
advice EC and Constituencies appropriately, therefore interfacing with
ICANN finance and other stakeholders including potential funders on
one-on-one becomes imperative so as to follow the money and learn the
priorities of our respective stakeholder groups and where to harness
accordingly.

Please permit me to respond a few others inline as below.

*We are talking about a very small pot of money here; relative to what the
NCSG has in the bank (metaphorically speaking, as the NCSG does not even
have a bank account).*

1. Yes, we in FC are aware of these and would not want to be limited by
what is now as it's anticipated the wind will change for better all things
being equal with collaboration and support of EC.

*Auditing roles et al:*
I have copied  and pasted below a part of the charter under Section 2.6
outside the charge for FC to account for all funds received by NCSG (NPOC
and NCUC).
"*Financial reports must be prepared annually and be made public.*
*• Provide internal conflict resolution process regarding funds.*
*• Provide the oversight of the Treasurer function.*
*• Fulfill any other accounting auditing or other prescribed financial
requirements as set by the ICANN Board of Directors for organizations
within the ICANN"*

This notwithstanding, I have a feeling the charter envisaged the jobs of
financial secretary, treasurer and auditor combined for FC and I stand to
be corrected. And until we have this tripod assignment clear in mind there
are likely of anyone saying FC is assuming too much, so there is no
overstepping of remit as you can see above.

*I see a lot of text around appropriating resources for the Finance
Committee itself -- travel slots, 20% of any and all NCSG funds for
administrative incidentals, etc.*

Well, I addressed the importance of networking for FC earlier especially as
regards the need to follow the money in and out of ICANN.

The 20% is actually to take care of the bank and associated charges on
disbursables as may be approved by EC, it's not anticipated to go beyond
that, outside the fact that whatever gets disbursed in the event that C's
have to apply for funds to do their work and outreach or if inflow is to be
shared for C's based on whatever is approved by EC eventually.
Additionally the job details as contained in the charter is huge enough and
we are planning for a work plan after this OP has been concluding
FC-focused outreach to afford our SG stakeholders know more about NCSG-FC
activities and other ICANN community at large.

It's obvious that since 2011 NCSG community has not been faithful to the
provision of annual accounts that encourages fair accountability, openness
and transparency and we want to work with all to ensure that compliance is
done in  this accounting year moving forward.

* Will it be scrutinising ICANN's annual budget and working with the Policy
Committee to prepare a comment? *

Yes, of course we all are here to make NCSG great and do not have any
reason to shy aware from anything that will bring progress in this SG,
including Additional Budgetary Requests (ABR) and/or Additional Fund
Requests (AFR) whichever one is more applicable plus the backing from EC.

Working with PC and EC and entire community is not negotiable. This was why
I had persistently said that all hands must be on the deck which is in the
best interest of NCSG to provide all vital environment for FC to excel
without any prejudice in order to be seen as living our Charter.

I hope this helps in assuaging any fears you may have.

Let us know if you still question.

Regards
Remmy
Member, NCSG-FC

On Mon, 16 Jul 2018 11:09 pm Ayden Férdeline, <icann at ferdeline.com> wrote:

> Thato,
>
> Thanks for drafting this. It is great to see that the Finance Committee is
> active again. In principle I support having internal operating procedures,
> but I guess my concern is, do we need so many? We are talking about a very
> small pot of money here; relative to what the NCSG has in the bank
> (metaphorically speaking, as the NCSG does not even have a bank account),
> are we engineering too many procedures for its oversight? I'm also
> concerned that the Finance Committee seems to be overstepping its remit; it
> is not an internal auditor, the finances of the NCSG's constituencies are
> not its responsibility. I see a lot of text around appropriating resources
> for the Finance Committee itself -- travel slots, 20% of any and all NCSG
> funds for administrative incidentals, etc -- but no language around what
> the Finance Committee will actually do for the NCSG. Will it be
> scrutinising ICANN's annual budget and working with the Policy Committee to
> prepare a comment? Will it be working with the Executive Committee and the
> Policy Committee to submit Additional Budgetary Requests to support our
> campaigns and policy work? I'd hope so, and it might be helpful to think
> about how the Finance Committee can help the NCSG and our members where it
> really matters: defending and protecting non-commercial uses and users of
> the Domain Name System.
>
> Best wishes, Ayden
>
>
> ‐‐‐‐‐‐‐ Original Message ‐‐‐‐‐‐‐
> On 16 July 2018 10:36 AM, Thato Mfikwe <thatomfikwe at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Dear colleagues,
>
> I am glad to announce that the* Finance Committee of NCSG
> <https://community.icann.org/display/gnsononcomstake/Committees-2018>* is
> now in place and ready to tackle governance issues within NCSG to ensure
> the high levels of transparency and accountability as enshrined in section
> 2.6 of the NCSG charter in relation to the NCSG Finance committee. The
> current members of NCSG FC are Farzaneh Badii (NCSG Chair), Remmy Nweke
> (NPOC rep) and Thato Mfikwe (NCUC rep). The FC will periodically upload its
> documents on the *NCSG FC Wikispace*
> <https://community.icann.org/display/gnsononcomstake/Finance+Committee#Information-175761693> for
> the community to keep upto date with current and planned activities and
> have access to committee-generated action plans, reports and documents, so
> lookout for monthly updates.
>
> Please note the FC has not been fully operational in past years with no
> historical financial records or operational guidelines to show for the past
> FY activities, thus the current committee intends to build and establish
> this important pillar of NCSG governance. The NCSG FC does not have an
> account, has no agreed formula on how funds should be distributed by the
> NCSG EC to constituencies and has had no visibility within NCSG activities
> yet, therefore a solid OP will be critical in getting the ball rolling to
> put NCSG FC on its right pedestal.
>
> The NCSG Finance Committee* Operational Procedure Draft document
> <https://docs.google.com/document/d/1XBL9khOhzxRRu5BiwCNeGu4suSfAw3tHFnNldeirnJQ/edit>
> *is available for comment, please note that the FC has only had
> discussion around the OP but no formal consensus has been reached yet.
>
> The Finance Committee DRAFT OP is built upon and guided by clauses
> contained in the *NCSG Charter*
> <https://gnso.icann.org/en/improvements/ncsg-charter-05may11-en.pdf>
> (Section 2.6) which was adopted in May 2011, a long standing document that
> guides activities and operations of NCSG and all its committees.
>
> The comment process will start today, 1*5* July 2018 and end on the 3rd
> of August 2018 at 12am UTC, upon which, the FC will review comments, make
> necessary resolutions and send the second draft OP to the NCSG EC for
> approval and adoption.
>
> At the same time, the Finance Committee would like to know if there are
> any major points that we (FC members) might missed in the coverage of this
> Operational Procedure?
>
>
>
> The NCSG FC welcomes your comments with relevant rationale and looks
> forward to speaking with you more about how to best support the NCSG
> community activities throughout the year.
>
> Hoping to sharing a bit more on the NCSG FC updates in the next call later
> on, thanks.
>
>
> Yours in development,
>
> Thato Mfikwe.
>
> NCSG Finance Committee Chair
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Ncuc-discuss mailing list
> Ncuc-discuss at lists.ncuc.org
> https://lists.ncuc.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/ncuc-discuss
>

On 16 Jul 2018 11:09 pm, "Ayden Férdeline" <icann at ferdeline.com> wrote:

Thato,

Thanks for drafting this. It is great to see that the Finance Committee is
active again. In principle I support having internal operating procedures,
but I guess my concern is, do we need so many? We are talking about a very
small pot of money here; relative to what the NCSG has in the bank
(metaphorically speaking, as the NCSG does not even have a bank account),
are we engineering too many procedures for its oversight? I'm also
concerned that the Finance Committee seems to be overstepping its remit; it
is not an internal auditor, the finances of the NCSG's constituencies are
not its responsibility. I see a lot of text around appropriating resources
for the Finance Committee itself -- travel slots, 20% of any and all NCSG
funds for administrative incidentals, etc -- but no language around what
the Finance Committee will actually do for the NCSG. Will it be
scrutinising ICANN's annual budget and working with the Policy Committee to
prepare a comment? Will it be working with the Executive Committee and the
Policy Committee to submit Additional Budgetary Requests to support our
campaigns and policy work? I'd hope so, and it might be helpful to think
about how the Finance Committee can help the NCSG and our members where it
really matters: defending and protecting non-commercial uses and users of
the Domain Name System.

Best wishes, Ayden

‐‐‐‐‐‐‐ Original Message ‐‐‐‐‐‐‐
On 16 July 2018 10:36 AM, Thato Mfikwe <thatomfikwe at gmail.com> wrote:

Dear colleagues,

I am glad to announce that the* Finance Committee of NCSG
<https://community.icann.org/display/gnsononcomstake/Committees-2018>* is
now in place and ready to tackle governance issues within NCSG to ensure
the high levels of transparency and accountability as enshrined in section
2.6 of the NCSG charter in relation to the NCSG Finance committee. The
current members of NCSG FC are Farzaneh Badii (NCSG Chair), Remmy Nweke
(NPOC rep) and Thato Mfikwe (NCUC rep). The FC will periodically upload its
documents on the *NCSG FC Wikispace*
<https://community.icann.org/display/gnsononcomstake/Finance+Committee#Information-175761693>
for
the community to keep upto date with current and planned activities and
have access to committee-generated action plans, reports and
documents, so  lookout
for monthly updates.

Please note the FC has not been fully operational in past years with no
historical financial records or operational guidelines to show for the past
FY activities, thus the current committee intends to build and establish
this important pillar of NCSG governance. The NCSG FC does not have an
account, has no agreed formula on how funds should be distributed by the
NCSG EC to constituencies and has had no visibility within NCSG activities
yet, therefore a solid OP will be critical in getting the ball rolling to
put NCSG FC on its right pedestal.

The NCSG Finance Committee* Operational Procedure Draft document
<https://docs.google.com/document/d/1XBL9khOhzxRRu5BiwCNeGu4suSfAw3tHFnNldeirnJQ/edit>
*is available for comment, please note that the FC has only had discussion
around the OP but no formal consensus has been reached yet.

The Finance Committee DRAFT OP is built upon and guided by clauses
contained in the *NCSG Charter*
<https://gnso.icann.org/en/improvements/ncsg-charter-05may11-en.pdf>
(Section 2.6) which was adopted in May 2011, a long standing document that
guides activities and operations of NCSG and all its committees.

The comment process will start today, 1*5* July 2018 and end on the 3rd of
August 2018 at 12am UTC, upon which, the FC will review comments, make
necessary resolutions and send the second draft OP to the NCSG EC for
approval and adoption.

At the same time, the Finance Committee would like to know if there are any
major points that we (FC members) might missed in the coverage of this
Operational Procedure?

The NCSG FC welcomes your comments with relevant rationale and looks
forward to speaking with you more about how to best support the NCSG
community activities throughout the year.

Hoping to sharing a bit more on the NCSG FC updates in the next call later
on, thanks.

Yours in development,

Thato Mfikwe.

NCSG Finance Committee Chair

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