[adcom] understanding the budget departments

[Dan Corrigan]

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treasurer's report 20107 - please distribute freely
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subject: understanding the budget departments

to understand the upcoming budget it will be important to know about the
departments

first, in the approach i'm taking for this process, i'm viewing this budget
as being a distribution of resources, in this case money, across a list of
activities, answering the question: what do we want to get done in 2002?

so far the work of the budget process has been focused on creating that
list of activities

actually, the correct term is 'nominal chart of accounts', not 'list of
activities'

the nominal chart of accounts is organized into ten major categories
('departments') each one roughly based on one of the ten key values. this
is the list:

C - Grassroots Democracy (keyword: CITIZEN)
D - Decentralization (keyword: DECENT)
E - Ecological Wisdom (keyword: ECOLOGY)
F - Focus on Sustainability (keyword: FUTURE)
G - Postpatriarchal Values (keyword: GENDER)
J - Social Justice and Equal Opportunity (keyword: JUSTICE)
M - Community-Based Economics (keyword: MARKET)
P - Nonviolence (keyword: PEACE)
R - Respect for Diversity (keyword: RESPECT)
S - Personal and Global Responsibility (keyword: SOCIETY)

to view the sub-categories ('programs') assigned to each of these
departments please visit the gogreens.com site and review the pages there
related to the 'mgp budget'.

please note that these sub-categories are still in flux and will be
changing over the next few weeks. however, they are probably 90% assigned,
so now is the time for all good greens to come to the aid of their party in
the form of reviewing the work done so far and commenting re: is anything
missing or mis-assigned

a short pep-talk:

to date an approximate combined total of 38 hours (not counting travel
time) has been spent on this process. let me ask a provocative question: is
one of those hours yours? did you contribute, according to one of these
methods:

1. by phone to 508-432-2435?
2. by email to books at acircle.com?
3. by reviewing the site at gogreens.com and commenting on the process
displayed there?
4. by attending one of the dibner building meetings?

remember, if someone wants to be critical of the budget process that i've
conducted to date, and that person has not at least reviewed the
gogreens.com site, then that will look like someone is just not trying,
won't it?

about the comments we've received via one of these four methods: we
currently have received over 340 comments. are any of these comments yours?
please review these comments, which are all viewable at

http://www.gogreens.com/mgp/bin/mgp.pl?c2comments

my intent is to continue collecting until we have 1,000+ comments

those who want to know what mass greens rank-and-file are thinking might
want to review this list, or further explore the gogreens.com site where
these comments are distributed to the 'departments' mentioned above

remember, to be successful, our budget must be a reflection of the real
intent of the mgp, as manifest by members and chapters. please contibute
your thoughts to the process. the benefits of your participating may seem
minor or perhaps even irrelevant, but believe me it helps fill out and
charge the system with energy

thanks for your interest, and i look forward to a dramatic surge in
participation based on response to this email

yours,

dan corrigan, treasurer mgp

ps: that site again: http://www.gogreens.com - follow the link to mgp
budget process