Dear friends,
After much unexpected delay, I am at last ready to ask you to read and
comment on this DRAFT statement of principles for remuneration of the
RIPE Chairs, which follows from a recommendation of the RIPE 2020
Nominating Committee.
As your mail-reading app allows, you may choose to read this message
either as plain text or as HTML; I also attach a PDF edition.
I look forward to reading your comments.
Best regards,
Niall O'Reilly, RIPE Vice-Chair
This section is to be removed prior to publication.
The RIPE Chair and Vice-Chair (together, the RIPE Chairs) have roles
described in The RIPE Chair (ripe-714). They are selected according
to the process set out in The RIPE Chair Selection Process
(ripe-727).
Over the years taking on the role of a RIPE Chair has become a
significant commitment, as recognized in discussions on the RIPE Discussion List
in 2017 and 2018.
The sensitivity to conflicts of interest has increased too.
In 2020 the RIPE Nominating committee selected Mirjam Kühne as RIPE
Chair. Mirjam needed to resign from her job with the RIPE NCC before
taking on the role. On recommendation by the Nominations Committee the
RIPE NCC offered to provide reasonable remuneration while making
arrangements so that Mirjam can act without undue influence from the
RIPE NCC.
During this process questions were raised from the community about
providing remuneration for RIPE Chairs and specifically whether it is
appropriate that the RIPE NCC provides such funding.
The RIPE Nominating committee made this recommendation (among others)
in its report ( ripe-762), “Document community consensus about
remuneration of the RIPE Chairs”.
At the time of writing the community has had some experience with
the arrangements mentioned above.
This document describes the principles of the RIPE community for
remuneration of the RIPE Chairs including requests to the RIPE NCC in
this regard.
The community wishes to be sure that the RIPE Chairs are able to put
in the necessary effort for their roles and to stay clear of the
perception of undue influence.
RIPE Chairs will disclose to the community all potential conflicts of
interest arising from their role as RIPE Chair as they arise including
how they address them. In particular they will disclose their
significant means of subsistence. RIPE Chair nominees will make this
disclosure to the RIPE Nominating Committee.
The community requests that the RIPE NCC continue to reimburse the
expenses incurred by the RIPE Chairs in their roles.
The community requests that, upon request by a RIPE Chair, the RIPE
NCC provides appropriate remuneration for the time the RIPE Chair
spends fulfilling their role.
The community requests that the concrete arrangements for this shall
ensure that the RIPE Chairs can perform their duties without undue
influence from the RIPE NCC and that the RIPE NCC informs the
community how this is arranged.
The community requests the RIPE NCC Executive Board take responsibility
for implementing these concrete arrangements.
The community requests that the RIPE NCC continues to disclose the
total cost of RIPE Chair support including expenses and any
remuneration.
The RIPE Chairs started working on this document in mid-2022, taking
advice from the RIPE NCC. Daniel Karrenberg subsequently made a more
concise draft on request of the RIPE Chairs.
The RIPE NCC has indicated that it will consider the requests made in
this document once the community reaches consensus on the final text.