Dear Commission Chairs and Members of the Council,

The large swing in currency exchange rates has made the conference fee limit of $500 [this is typo. it should be $400] almost impossible for conferences outside the US. Bob Barber and I have had a number of people express this concern to us. Yves, Bob and I think it would be a good idea to have an email vote of the Council to raise the rates now and not wait for the Council meeting in October.

Bob has prepared the table below to indicate what has happened. He proposes that we change the limit to 460 Euros. Before we take an email vote, I thought it would be a good idea to allow a few days for discussion. If you have any concerns about this change, please send a message to the entire group by this Friday. If we do not hear many concerns, we will then circulate an email ballot to the Council on this issue.

Best regards,
Judy

The change in value is shown in the table. In column 2 it is assumed that the conference fee is set in USD at US $400, and its value is expressed in Euros. In column 3, it is assumed that the fee is set at Euros 462 and the value of the fee is shown in USD.