... I have no idea how that happened. As you can see I've been working too hard for the people of Talossa and my brain is melting.  :-[

Hello, yes. Please to be clarking The 55th Cosa Budget.

WHEREAS the Organic Law directs that each government submit a budget by the second Clark of their Cosa term,

AND WHEREAS this bill has been approved by all members of the Cabinet; so

PART A: Appropriations Request

His Majesty's Government hereby submits to the Ziu a request for the appropriation of funds from the Royal Treasury totaling 356¤46 ($535.15) for the specific purposes and subject to restrictions as outlined herein:

STUFF:

• Webhosting costs for nine months with DoRoyal: 53¤26 ($80.15)
• Promoting Talossa's social media posts,  ℓ20 ($30)

FINANCE:

for fees for a Registered Agent to represent Talossa as an Unincorporated Association under the laws of the State of Wisconsin, to enable us to formally hold property, 66¤40 ($100)

CULTURE:

• Prizes for cultural contests, 66¤40 ($100)
  
• Honoraria for writers of articles for a new Talossan cultural magazine,  ℓ150 ($225)

FURTHERMORE, notwithstanding the above allocations, no funds shall be disbursed without a notice of disbursement having first been transmitted to the Ziu at least fourteen days prior to the disbursement, except that disbursements solely for the purpose of postage may be made with no less than 24 hours notice. Notices shall contain details of the purchase and a cost estimate for the purchase, or the total amount paid if seeking funds for reimbursement. Copies of receipts and/or invoices will be provided upon request to Members of the Ziu.

FURTHERMORE, any funds allocated by this section shall be retained in the central fund by the Burgermeister of Inland Revenue until such time as they are disbursed. Funds not disbursed prior to the end of the government term shall remain in the central fund.

PART B. Fundraiser, Minting, and Other Authorizations

FURTHERMORE, the Minister of Finance, or her appointed deputy shall undertake to create manage and promote a voluntary fundraising campaign,  to the citizens of Talossa and other interested parties over the course of the term,. The targeted amount for the campaign shall be ℓ325 ($487.50). The proceeds of seignorage, sales of stamps, TalossaWare proceeds, and other voluntary contributions shall be included in this total except as provided elsewhere. The expected income for the term is as follows:

    Proceedings of sales (Coins/Stamps/Talossaware) + Donations to the Kingdom: ℓ325 ($487.50)
    Registration fees for Cosa election: ℓ20 ($30)
    Registration fees for Senäts election: ℓ10 ($15)
    Interest on Talossa's bank accounts: ℓ5 ($7.5)

Total: +ℓ360 (+$540)


PART C: Investment Policy

FURTHERMORE, His Majesty's Government hereby directs the Burgermeister of Inland Revenue to invest all held funds into an interest-bearing savings account unless or until otherwise directed or advised by act of the Ziu.

Quote from: Sir Alexandreu Davinescu on November 17, 2020, 09:40:18 PM
This means that there is another budget that is implied that has a total expenditure of $200, since "certain appropriations" won't be spent.  I'm asking for an itemization of that $200 budget.  Out of the optimistic $585.15, what makes the cut at $200

Oh, got you now. The answer is as follows:

Projected (minimum) income:

    Registration fees for Cosa election: $30-40
    Registration fees for Senäts election (assuming the Fleecing Bill passes): $15
    Interest on Talossa's bank accounts: $8

Total: $63

Projected essential spending:

• for webhosting for the next 9 months, $80.15;
• for promoting Talossa's social media posts, $30
• for fees for a Registered Agent to represent Talossa as an Unincorporated Association under the laws of the State of Wisconsin, to enable us to formally hold property, $100
• Culture Ministry appropriations, $50

Total: $260.15

I should also note that the Registered Agent expenditure is contingent on a report on the costs/benefits of this scheme which the Cabinet has yet to see. So we may not decide to go ahead with that, but best to make the appropriation in any case.

REPORT ON THE SECOND NATIONAL SURVEY

Raw results available on the National Webspace.

Summary of Recommendations

The Office of the Seneschál, based on the input of the Talossan people as provided by this survey, will recommend the following to Cabinet and the Ziu:

• Promoting non Wittenberg ways for Talossans to meet up. The Ministry of STUFF will accelerate and prioritise plans for a Talossan social media system and promote live video and Instant Messaging interactions between Talossans. The Ministry of the Interior will also investigate ways of encouraging real life meet ups between Talossans , perhaps based in the Greater Talossan Area itself or based on provinces.
• Reforms/tweaks to the current Immigration system. The Ministry of STUFF will investigate technological ways to alert existing citizens to new prospectives. The Ministry of the Interior will examine possible non technological improvements to the Immigration system, including ways to encourage prospectives to introduce themselves in a way which improves citizen engagement. This may involve the Seneschál's previously stated interest in restoring the requirement for citizens to read up on Talossan history and perhaps answer questions on it.
• The Bureu del Ghleþ will discuss with SIGN the best ways to produce new Talossan language learner materials, as well as literature both originally written in and translated into the national language.
• The Culture Ministry will recommit to prioritising the promotion and/or organisation of Talossan games, competitions and quizzes.
• The previous survey raised the ideas of "exit interviews for departing citizens" and "a week/month in review thread". These suggestions were not repeated this time, but those who are still interested in those ideas might want to raise them again.

Quote from: Sir Alexandreu Davinescu on November 16, 2020, 08:47:53 PM
I will note, however, that it is extremely unwise for a legislature to authorize a budget that isn't actually itemized. If the amount that the Government plans to raise doesn't materialize, then it's good that they are saying that they won't actually spend most of the treasury. But it's not good that they're not seeing exactly how much they would spend, or on what.

You appear to be saying that you don't think there's sufficient detail in the appropriations requests. Can I ask exactly how much more detail you would like for each of the proposed expenditures?

• for webhosting for the next 9 months, $80.15;
• for promoting Talossa's social media posts, $30
• for prizes for cultural contests, $100;
• for honoraria for writers of articles for a new Talossan cultural magazine, $225
• for fees for a Registered Agent to represent Talossa as an Unincorporated Association under the laws of the State of Wisconsin, to enable us to formally hold property, $100
  

The Culture Minister, above, has explained how he has arrived at the figure for honoraria for a magazine. As to the fees for a Registered Agent, I am still awaiting a report from citizen Tresplett on precisely which option he recommends for this; $100 is a maximum fee, based on a very cursory Google. What other details would you like?

The Cabinet is, at the moment, unified behind my approach. May I ask whether you would be planning to veto this budget?

Given all these comments, I foreshadow that I intend to Clark the 55th Cosa Budget as drafted above. We will seek a target of total coin/stamp sales, and "voluntary taxation" donations from Citizens, of $550 to fully cover all the Government spending appropriated. However, if we don't get that funding from citizens, I pledge that the effective deficit will be limited to $200 maximum; that is, if we don't get the funding, certain appropriations will never be spent.

I have completed my draft report on the Second National Activity Survey, and it is currently before Cabinet for comments/final sign-off.

My personal preference would be for people to use their real names, in Talossan-language equivalents if they prefer. That said, as long as we have a Senator of the Kingdom who won a Cort case saying that he was entirely entitled to use a pseudonym and not give his real name, and has celebrated his victory for the last year by *checks notes* voting CONTRA on every single bill until we finally vote him out of there, just to be a verpa, I think we have to accept that that's the way things stand.

Am I to understand the Regent that Immigration should be announcing, or hinting, to prospectives that pseudonyms are frowned upon? I think that would be a bit heavy-handed. Free Democrats tend to go for "anything not expressly forbidden has to be tolerated".

The National Survey has concluded, and I am pleased to announce we got at least 50 responses, significantly higher response than last time.

A formal report will take a while to prepare, as (a) I'm quite exhausted, (b) the raw data shouldn't just be released because some of it includes abuse of particular Talossan leading figures (!!!) and some names need to be redacted.

I'm sorry, Mr Speaker, but this procedure is entirely new to me, and I'm not entirely sure what you want me to do.

Except to say: "Vote PËR on everything on this Clark". Grült méirçi.

I agree that there is no longer a problem. Every applicant accepted for prospective citizenship must satisfy Immigration that they are a real person and give acceptable evidence of their identity. I'm not entirely sure where the Regent's line of questioning is going, but it seems to be in the direction that it is unseemly that anyone should be allowed to use a pseudonym in Talossa - which is bizarre because as far as I recall, the Regent gets VERY jumpy when anyone in Talossa posts his street name in a public forum. The use of pseudonyms is only an extra layer of security under changing your name into our national language for those who want to keep their Talossan life compartmentalised.

The problem with "Sebastian Panache" was never that he used a pseudonym, it's that he never gave his real name at all, and we only found it out by accident.

As Seneschál, I believe the consensus of the Cabinet at the time was, after Justice Nordselva said he couldn't do nuthin' on appeal, we believed we had reached the end of our legal resources.

On the contrary, that's why I am more confident about appropriating them up front, and only spending them if we need to. You will be aware that spending which isn't appropriated up front can be authorised by a PD, which cuts the Ziu out of the equation and is IMHO less democratic. Better to over-appropriate than under-appropriate, IMHO.