Thanks Tim for your work on this. Please note my comments below. Also, I think I am not overly confident that we can do this in three weeks but I am willing to try. And I am also thinking that we may need a special conference call to do it. There may be other areas where changes are needed as well and I will add more later. Chuck
-----Original Message----- From: owner-council@gnso.icann.org [mailto:owner-council@gnso.icann.org] On Behalf Of Tim Ruiz Sent: Saturday, March 28, 2009 7:44 AM To: council@gnso.icann.org Subject: RE: [council] Draft Revisions to the ICANN Bylaws Relating to GNSO Restructure
Thought we should start trying to capture suggested changes in the document. The attached is a red line with the following suggested changes:
X.3.1
Deleted the restrictive language about all Constituencies being allocated a Council seat.
Chuck: I support this deletion and add the comments I inserted in the redlined version of the draft Bylaws changes that I sent yesterday: ". I suggest that this condition be deleted and that this objective be left to the SGs to define in their charters. The Board will approve the charters so that should be the means of dealing with the intent here."
X.3.3
Modified with a compromise to address Avri's concern. Just a suggestion, not necessarily supported by the RrC yet.
Chuck: I need more time to think about this and to check it out with the RyC. In my first pass, I was okay with the way this section was written and I understand Avri's point. But I also think that a House is in the best position to determine whether or not a NomCom rep is constructively contributing in an independ manner or not and that turning this decision over to the full Council could make it a very political action where the other House could be more interested in leaving a NomCom rep seated who favors their interests. Maybe there are other ways to deal with Avri's concern like developing some requirements that must be met if such an action was taken; those could be in the Rules rather than the Bylaws.
X.3.6
Deleted the unnecessary and restrictive language regarding Board seat selections.
Chuck: I think I am okay with this deletion. In my comments in the first draft I raised this question: "What is meant by an appointed representative to a SG? Is this supposed to be SG appointed representative to the GNSO Council?" I would add this question: What was the purpose of the restrictive language and how did it relate to the GNSO recommendations regarding this issue?
X.3.8
No changes, but something we need to discuss further. There may be advantages to allowing the Nominating Committee to make this assignment based on criteria provided by the Council as a whole (for the Council level NCA) and by criteria provided by each of the houses for their NCA (but final criteria approved by the Council as a whole). That said, that is just a personal observation for consideration, not an RrC position.
Chuck: Agree that more discussion of this would be good. I personally like the idea of providing some criteria to the NomCom as long as it does not overly restrict the independence of the NomCom reps. For example, I believe it would be helpful for the NomCom appointee to the contracted house have a certain base of knowledge about registries and registrars and some of the particular contract requirements that impact them regarding policy development. Similarly, I think it might be useful for the NomCom appointee to have a balance of experience in both the non-commercial and commercial worlds.
X.5.1
Modified to be consistent with reality, and the changes made to X.3.1.
Chuck: Here is the comment I inserted to the draft changes I sent around yesterday regarding the last sentence of this section: "Why put this in the Bylaws and thereby create the need for Bylaws amendments? Why are Council seats assumed to be connected to constituencies? They should be elected according to the Board approved SG charters. I suggest deleting this sentence because it would essentially establish a perpetual need to revise the structure and/or procedures."
XX.5.4
Modifed the timeline for the new Council to be as soon as practical after Sydney, but no later than the commencement of the meeting in October. Again, just a suggestion but this seems to be more realistic.
Chuck: In my comments to the first draft of the Bylaws, I took a slightly different approach. I changed references to June to general references to 'when the bicameral structure is implemented.'
XX.5.5
Modified to be consistent with the changes in X.3.1 and X.5.1.
Chuck: Not sure what changes are needed in XX 5.5?
XX.5.11
Modified to be consistent with the changes to XX.5.4. The voting thresholds will be in place when the new Council is seated, whenever that may be.
Chuck: I added one category: "All other GNSO Business (other than Board elections): simple majority of both voting houses." And I also think that the following requirement should be added: "The initial thresholds must be approved by at least 60% of both houses and the Board and any revisions to the thresholds must be approved by at least 60% of both houses and the Board."
XX.5.12
Modified to be consistent with the changes to XX.5.4.
Chuck: See my comment on XX 5.4.
Tim
-------- Original Message -------- Subject: Re: [council] Draft Revisions to the ICANN Bylaws Relating to GNSO Restructure From: Avri Doria <avri@psg.com> Date: Fri, March 27, 2009 3:16 pm To: "council@gnso.icann.org" <council@gnso.icann.org>
hi,
A few question/comments on first reading.
-- X3.1
Each Stakeholder Group may select representatives according to its Charter procedures subject to the provision that each Board-recognized Constituency shall be allocated a minimum of one seat on the GNSO Council.
I question whether this is indeed in keeping with the intent of the Board mandated changes as I thought they intended to break the direct connection between constituencies and council seats.
X3.3
I think that this would possibly stifle an outside voice in one of the houses. I think that condition C should apply no matter what house a NCA happens to be in. If the aggrieved house cannot make its case to the entire council then perhaps its grievance is not as 'for cause' as they believe.
X3.6
I thought that this was still an open issue waiting board consideration. As I described in the original report, I still believe that this will lessen the legitimacy of the board member vis a vis the other members, as this person would not have been elected by an SO but only by part of an SO.
x3.8
and one voting member appointed by the ICANN Nominating Committee
this read as if the Nomcom is going to determine which NCA sits where. I would recommend removing removing the line from each of the paragraphs and inserting:
c. One of the council members appointed by the ICANN Nominating Committee will be serve as a voting member of each house
the way this is done would then be put in the Operating rules
x4.1
As mentioned above I think the last paragraph is not in keeping with the Board's intent to separate seating on the council from constituency existence. If we do this, I believe we have negated one of the main advantages to be gained from the separation of constituency from stakeholder group.
thanks
a.