Lower Nicola Indian Band
Suggested terms of reference for updating LNIB Chief & Council honorarium framework and rates, subject to Chief & Council discussion and recommendation, and approval of LNIB membership at a duly convened LNIB general meeting.
The framework, rates and amounts suggested below are not set in stone in any way; they are only amounts suggested for discussion purposes only. C&C at its sole discretion will agree on the amounts and rates that will in turn suggest to LNIB membership for approval.
a)Chief & Council recognizes that Council members are often required to dedicate a substantial amount of time to attend meetings beyond the amount of time expected for C&C meetings, Band general meetings, committee meetings, and meeting community members. Often, Council members are expected to attend meetings during their working hours taking them away of their employment or business without any compensation and at their own personal cost;
b)In most of these instances, these meetings involve lengthy negotiations of impact management benefit agreements involving often many out-of-town meetings, under the auspices of the Negotiations Committee, for which LNIB could (and should) charge the proponents for the time that Council members and staff members have to dedicate to their files.
c)We suggest that LNIB develops a revenue strategy for negotiation of IMBAs where the proponents are notified at the beginning of the negotiation process of the cost of having Council members and staff members to attend meetings. Some First Nation governments in BC charge between $300 and $500 per day for elected leaders and senior staff members, and between $150 and $300 per day for other staff members, and have these costs identified in advance in their negotiations budgets. Under this arrangement, proponents will pay for the cost of negotiating arrangements with LNIB, knowing well in advance how much the cost of negotiation will be, and LNIB will not subsidize in any way these costs, which should be born by the proponent.
d)In terms of time expected from Council members, LNIB has full-time council members (full-time Chief and full-time Councillor), and Councillors in regular time, who are sometimes required to dedicate a variable amount of time in addition to their day-to-day basic responsibilities and expectations.
e)For accountability and transparency purposes, we suggest that Councillors who are not full-time (Councillors in regular time), would be required to file a monthly report outlining the activities that they were engaged during that period, and a claim for payment of additional time spent in LNIB business.
f)We also suggest that for Full-time Chief and Full-time Councillorwould be required to file prepare a monthly report on meetings, events and activities that they participated, including the date, location, duration time, and purpose or nature of the meeting or engagement.
g)The claims for additional time spent in LNIB business submitted by regular time Councillors will be processed using a standard form created for this purposed and submitted monthly to the Executive Director for payment.
h)We suggest that honorarium for Councillors in regular time (not full-time) be set at $1,800 per month, from the current rate of $1,650 per month.
i)We suggest that when Councillors in regular time are required to dedicate more time in assignments requiring more time than the basic responsibilities and expectations,that they would be paid $50 per hour for a maximum of five hours per day ($250 maximum per day), and a maximum of $1,500 per month, for which the Councillors are required to file a claim for payment, which must include a time sheet with details of the meetings attended or tasks assigned by Chief & Council. Under this arrangement, the payment to Councillors in regular time will be capped at $3,300 per month ($1,800 + $1,500) for a maximum of 30 extra hours billable per month. Under this arrangement, any amount over this maximum ($1,800 + $1,500 per month) will not be paid.
j)We suggest that for full-time Councillor position, by which is required to dedicate 7 hours per day, five days a week, the Councillorbe paid a fixed honorarium payment of $5,000 per month (currently $4,800), paid bi-weekly, for a total annual cost of $60,000 per year plus benefits package equivalent to the one available to LNIB full-time employees. Under this arrangement any time or any amount over the amount of $5,000 per month will not be paid, and no overtime will be paid.
k)For the position of Full-time Chief, we suggest the honorarium to be set at $6,500 per month (from the current amount of $6,000), paid bi-weekly, plus benefits package equivalent tothe one available to full-time LNIB employees, for a total annual amount of $78,000. Under this arrangement any time or any amount over the amount of $6,500 per month will not be paid, and no overtime will be paid.
l)We believe that it is important that this policy be communicated to, discussed with, and approved by LNIB membership. This process will require time, but it can reasonably be completed by mid-February.
m)Any change to honorarium rates must be approved in advance by LNIB membership. We also suggest that this policy could be made retroactive to October 1st, 2016.
Draft prepared for discussion purposes only by Helder Ponte, Executive Director.
December 7th, 2016.
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