To: ALAC, CCNSO, GAC, GNSO, SSAC

Cc: CWG-Stewardship, ICG, CRISP, IANAPLAN, CCWG-Accountability, ICANN Implementation & ICANN Policy Staff.

Dear Chartering Organizations of the CWG IANA Stewardship,

Subject: CWG-Stewardship role in implementation

At ICANN54 in Dublin, the IANA Stewardship Coordination Group (ICG) confirmed designation of the operational communities to be responsible for direct implementation oversight of their proposals.

The CWG-Stewardship also met during the course of ICANN54 and discussed this role and we continued this discussion in a subsequent meeting on Thursday 5 November 2015. An oversight role is not specifically detailed in our Charter, but it is the CWG-Stewardship’s view that our role in implementation is to ensure that the implementation is consistent with the CWG-Stewardship Final Proposal and furthermore, to provide input on the implementation work when required by staff working on the implementation or, if and when necessary, to bring the implementation work back in line with the intent of the Final Proposal.

In our view, the most logical option is to have the CWG-Stewardship working group continue in its current form and with the responsibility to monitor the implementation and provide input where needed. Of course, this responsibility would include regular updates to the Chartering Organizations via the appointed members as well as consultations with the Chartering Organizations should issues be identified that are deemed without this specific remit.

We note here for your information, that while the CWG-Stewardship Final Proposal was submitted in June 2015, the CWG-Stewardship has remained active and therefore available when needed. This has included being available to answer questions from the ICG, or to monitor the CCWG-Accountability dependencies and to coordinate with the other operational communities on shared issues such as IANA intellectual property rights.

As the CWG-Stewardship Charter does not specifically address implementation, we would like to ensure that the CWG-Stewardship’s proposed approach in relation to implementation is not inconsistent with the intent of the Chartering Organizations concerning the scope and role of the CWG-Stewardship. We therefore propose to proceed to oversee the implementation work as described above unless there are objections from one or more Chartering Organizations.

We would like to emphasize that the CWG-Stewardship does not intend to change its working methods in light of this ongoing role. The group will remain open to anyone who wishes to join, and we will welcome informed individuals with relevant implementation and operational experience to join the CWG-Stewardship in this next phase.

Thank you for your consideration of this matter and for your ongoing support of our work. Please let us know of any concerns by no later than 30 November 2015.

Jonathan Robinson & Lise Fuhr

CWG-Stewardship co-Chairs