All:

I just wanted to let you know that the draft FY11 Operating Plan and Budget recently posted for further community feedback includes a response to the GNSO Council WHOIS studies request in the development of the budget.  Over $400k is now included in this draft FY11 budget for WHOIS fact based studies.  For reference, please note section 4.8 last paragraph (p22) and appendix A.8 (p61).   We also address it in Section 5: Budget as well as in Appendix C: response to comments.  See below.   

In Section 5.2.3 Professional services (see page 41):

· Economic and other studies, with an FY11 budget of $1.2 million, includes studies requested by the community such as:

§ SSAC requested studies on scaling and security

§ WHOIS fact based studies for policy development efforts as requested by the GNSO

§ Economic studies to complete New gTLD implementation

In Appendix C, we recap the responses to comments (see page 70):

Need for More Resources
Funds for fact-based research to support policy development (M. Cade, B.Tonkin)	More funds (over $710k) for fact based research to support PDPs. See section 5.
Whois studies and additional resources (C. Gomes, IPC)	More funds for Whois studies are provided in the draft FY11 document. . See section 5.

Please let me know if you have any questions.

Thanks, Liz