Chair’s Report for September 13th, 2013
Karen Judd Smith
Ongoing Meetings with Alliance in Vienna, Transparency International, Global Alliance on the Trafficking of Women and VNGO on Drugs
I have fairly consistent contact with Michael Platzer, Chair of the Vienna Alliance and through him the other organization representatives. The meetings of late have tended to focus in on the increasing challenges for CS participation in meetings and committees such as those dealing with Corruption and Trafficking.
The issues that are being raised in those discussions are relevant in the next section where I address the potential focus of an intern who has surfaced.
Also, Michale Platzer noted that he will be in NY in October and is interested in having lunch October 10th with any from the Alliance who could join the meeting to connect, discuss and network. He will be in attendance as the issues of Femicide and Trafficking in Women, issues the Vienna Alliance have been active in, are addressed by the GA around that time.
Intern:
Some time back a person contacted me about an internship with the Alliance. Actually, a few people have approached me over the last year or so as, I am sure,wereDr. Yael Danieli and others in their time as Chair.
I usually reply that we would be delighted, but cannot provide any funding for their work.
Recently I heard Sévane Tadevossian was back in New York and still interested in interning.
Having heard (see the article of concern on our site at: and hearing how NGOs are being blocked from participation where we used to have access, it seemed that it would be helpful to have Sévane do some work on the issue of NGO particicpation at UNHQ to give some better researched perspective on NGO participation and to support what seems to be a growing concern for CS in the CPCJ arena.
Gillian Dell — Head of Conventions Unit for Transparency International Secretariat, is now pulling together a report and legal argument for Civil Society participaion with a focus on UNODC and Vienna. KateSheill from Global Alliance Against Traffic in Women did something similar for Geneva (tho’ I haven’t seen this). And it seemed that if Sévane could look at trends in participation in NY with a focus on areas of interest to the Alliance, this would be most helpful as we move forward toward the 2015 Congress.
Sévane will participate in Friday’s meeting so we will have a chance to discuss this further at that time.
If this project moves forward, I am sure that each one of you will be able to provide key information, contacts and substantive ideas for how the report could evolve.
Website Statistics:
The following is a screen shot of the Google Analytics for the site, indicating the number of visitors to the site in the recent month.
The “online membership,” that is, those who have current subscriptions to the site is 129 as o 10th September. Each person on this list can subscribe or unsubscribe as they wish.
Regular Meeting Documents:
The Regular Meeting documents are posted regularly on the website for download. Each meeting has its own page and the general area is:
Directory of Experts:
At the last meetings the on-site framework for getting submissions for the “experts directory” was introduced. The Committee indicated their interest in reviewing this prior to sending out “invitations” to the larger NGO community to submit information for the Directory. Final discussion and vote is needed.
set-up for the
Annual Hosting Fee & Domain:
The annual service fee for hosting and domain renewal is coming up in December 1st and is $119.00 for the hosting and $14.99 for the domain cpcjalliance.org.
The total is $134.98 per year. Other costs are absorbed, courtesy Global Development.
Letter to Members and Potential Members for Annual Fees:
If the Board would identify a person to draft the “invitation to join the Alliance” letter / email, I can send it out in the coming months as we organizations prepare for the new year and make payments for their Annual Dues.
1