[At-Large] Auction Proceeds - where we are and what you can help

bzs at theworld.com bzs at theworld.com
Sun May 14 22:30:14 UTC 2017


On May 14, 2017 at 17:58 evan at telly.org (Evan Leibovitch) wrote:
 > On 14 May 2017 at 17:27, <bzs at theworld.com> wrote:
 > 
 >    
 >     That said I would agree that there is a tendency when running any
 >     ​ ​
 >     business that "excess" cash tends to get allocated one way or another
 >     ​ ​
 >     barring an iron-willed commitment otherwise which is not what I'd
 >     ​ ​
 >     expect of an organization structured like ICANN.
 > 
 > 
 > ​I don't know about that.
 > 
 > I've been involved with some nonprofits that believe it imperative to, as
 > possible, maintain a reserve fund to deal with unintended or unanticipated
 > circumstances. The amount of this reserve may be capped by taxation authorities
 > who don't want it too high, but having a substantial fund to guard against
 > liability, especially in uncharted territory such as ICANN's, is certainly
 > prudent.

The usual rule of thumb is one year's gross expenses though it's
fairly common to attach lists of exceptions to that number such as
risks in the future. For example the cost of a conference disaster*,
or pending lawsuits which wouldn't be reflected in backwards looking
budgets.

* Since ICANN doesn't seek cost recovery on conferences that one
probably isn't apt but I've seen it come up where there were
conference registration fees and/or trade show fees which were
expected to recover expenses, often hundreds of thousands of dollars
at risk. And in that case what happens if there's an airline strike,
weather, etc which shuts down a conference?

It's not difficult to imagine similar scenarios.

-- 
        -Barry Shein

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