10 April 2012
Establishment of New gTLD Program Committee
Resolved (2012.04.10.01), the Board hereby
establishes the Board New gTLD Program Committee as follows:
(i) the voting members of the Committee will consist of: Rod
Beckstrom, Cherine Chalaby, Chris Disspain, Bill Graham, Erika
Mann, Gonzalo Navarro, Ray Plzak, R. Ramaraj, George Sadowsky,
Mike Silber, and Kuo-Wei Wu; (ii) the liaisons to the
Committee will be Thomas Roessler; and (iii) the Chair of the
Committee will be Cherine Chalaby.
Resolved (2012.04.10.02), the Board hereby
delegates to the Board New gTLD Program Committee all legal
and decision making authority of the Board relating to the New
gTLD Program (for the round of the Program, which commenced in
January 2012 and for the related Applicant Guidebook that
applies to this current round) as set forth in its Charter,
which excludes those things that the Board is prohibited from
delegating by law, or pursuant to Article XII, Section 2 of
the ICANN Bylaws.
Resolved (2012.04.10.03), all members of the New
gTLD Program Committee reinforce their commitment to the 8
December 2011 Resolution of the Board (Resolution
2011.12.08.19) regarding Board member conflicts, and
specifying in part: "Any and all Board members who approve any
new gTLD application shall not take a contracted or employment
position with any company sponsoring or in any way involved
with that new gTLD for 12 months after the Board made the
decision on the application."
Resolved (2012.04.10.04), the Board directs the
CEO to prepare a document setting forth a process for the
creation of Board Committees to address future situations
where there may be multiple Board members with perceived,
potential or actual conflicts of interest on an issue.
In order to have efficient meetings and take
appropriate actions with respect to the New gTLD Program for
the current round of the Program and as related to the
Applicant Guidebook, the Board decided to create the "New
gTLD Program Committee" in accordance with Article XII of
the Bylaws and has delegated decision making authority to
the Committee as it relates to the New gTLD Program for the
current round of the Program which commenced in January 2012
and for the related Applicant Guidebook that applies to this
current round.
Establishing this new Committee without
conflicted members, and delegating to it decision making
authority, will provide some distinct advantages. First, it
will eliminate any uncertainty for conflict Board members
with respect to attendance at Board meetings and workshops
since the New gTLD Program topics can be dealt with at the
Committee level. Second, it will allow for actions to be
taken without a meeting by the committee. As the Board is
aware, actions without a meeting cannot be taken unless done
via electronic submission by unanimous consent; such
unanimous consent cannot be achieved if just one Board
member is conflicted. Third, it will provide the community
with a transparent view into the Board's commitment to
dealing with actual, potential or perceived conflicts.
This resolution should have a positive impact
on the community and ICANN as a whole as the New gTLD
Program Committee will be able to take actions relating to
the New gTLD Program for the current round of the Program
and as related to the Applicant Guidebook without any
question of conflict arising. No fiscal impact is
anticipated as a result of this action and there will be no
impact on the security, stability no resiliency of the
domain name system.
Kind Regards, Benedetta Rossi BC Secretariat https://community.icann.org/display/gnsobc/Home www.bizconst.org bc-secretariat@icann.org