[council] Draft Revisions to the ICANN Bylaws Relating to GNSO Restructure

[Gomes, Chuck]

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 at gnso.icann.org 
> [mailto:owner-council at gnso.icann.org] On Behalf Of Tim Ruiz
> Sent: Saturday, March 28, 2009 7:44 AM
> To: council at 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 at psg.com>
> Date: Fri, March 27, 2009 3:16 pm
> To: "council at gnso.icann.org" <council at 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.
>