Bert,
I think there are two key principles here, both of which I think the community has reached some consensus about. If they are applied, I think they answer your questions.
Principle 1: The IETF intends to establish a structure to get these administrative mechanisms and principles managed appropriately, according to good administrative, fiscal, and management principles, but not to try to micromanage the details. To repeat what many people have said in different ways, most of the IETF participants lack the interest and/or skills to properly micromanage this sort of effort, even if such micromanagement were appropriate.
Principle 2: The BCP document --perhaps as distinct from any transition ones-- should avoid extremely fine details to the extent possible, if only because revising such documents to make changes that become necessary takes too much community energy that ought to be going into better and faster standards and engineering work.
If we accept those principles, then getting the community, and the proposed BCP, involved with questions of how bank accounts are organized is as inappropriate as designating:
* the type of account to be used
* the currency in which the accounts are to be kept
* the country in which the banks are to be located
* the specific accounting models and standards to be used.
each of which is a subject that might be more important than how a bank account is designated.
What the BCP should say, IMO, is that IETF funds should be appropriately designated and segregated according to generally accepted accounting practices (that, for those who don't know, is a fairly specific term of art). Issues such as the above (including labels on bank accounts) should be left to professionals who can, e.g., consider what sorts of arrangements will provide the best balance between safety of funds and rate of return on investment (assuming that we do not want to leave those funds under a mattress somewhere). Our job, and that of the transition team and IAOC, should be to be sure that we have the right models for getting and following appropriate professional advice in these areas, not constraining those decisions with details about bank accounts. Especially for the "reserve" funds or any accumulating endowment, bank accounts might not even be the right model.
john
--On Friday, November 26, 2004 2:15 PM +0100 "Wijnen, Bert (Bert)" <bwijnen@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
In revision draft-ietf-iasa-bcp-00.txt we have text in sections 5 through 5.4 about IASA funding and where the money needs to be kept. Specifically, the current text suggests that there is/are one or more IASA specific bank accounts. Namely:
- Sect 5.1 says that meeting revenues go into IASA account. When I wrote that text I meant "IASA bank account", so if that is what we (IETF) want, then needs to be made more explicit.
- Sect 5.2 says that designated monitary donations go to the IASA account. Again, I meant to write "IASA bank account". So need clarification if that is what we (IETF) want.
- Sect 5.3 I think (I/we) intended (but is not explicit) to also have the quarterly deposits go into IASA bank account. So again needs clarification if that is what we (IETF) want.
- Sect 5.4 talks about reserve fund being kept in reserve for use by IASA. It is not specific how this is done. Current text leaves that up to ISOC to decide/arrange.
We have seen a few people raise concern about the above. Concerns that I have seen raised and to which I would like to see the IETF community speak their preference:
- should we (IETF) indeed have/request an IASA specific bank account for collecting meeting fees?
- should we (IETF) indeed have/request an IASA specific bank account for depositing designated monetary donations?
- should we (IETF) indeed have/request an IASA specific bank account for depositing ISOC controbutions to the IASA (as budgeted)?
- if yes to previosu question, should we (IETF) be so prescriptive in sect 5.3 about when ISOC puts money in an IASA (bank) account (e.g. quarterly and in equal portions) ?
- should we (IETF) request/require that the reserve fund is kept in an IASA specific bank account.
Bert
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