RE: [gnso-osc-ops] FW: Further Council Ops Procedures Concepts and Presentation

["Ron Andruff" <randruff@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

I, too, support these changes.

 

Kind regards,

 

RA

 

Ronald N. Andruff

RNA Partners, Inc.

220 Fifth Avenue, 20th floor

New York, New York 10001

 

www.rnapartners.com 

V: +1 212 481 2820 x 11

F:  +1 212 481 2859 

 

  _____  

From: owner-gnso-osc-ops@xxxxxxxxx [mailto:owner-gnso-osc-ops@xxxxxxxxx] On
Behalf Of KnobenW@xxxxxxxxxx
Sent: 2009-09-24 06:49
To: ray@xxxxxxxxx; gnso-osc-ops@xxxxxxxxx
Subject: AW: [gnso-osc-ops] FW: Further Council Ops Procedures Concepts and
Presentation

 

I'm ok with this text and form

 


Best regards 
Wolf-Ulrich

 

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Von: owner-gnso-osc-ops@xxxxxxxxx [mailto:owner-gnso-osc-ops@xxxxxxxxx] Im
Auftrag von Ray Fassett
Gesendet: Donnerstag, 24. September 2009 02:00
An: gnso-osc-ops@xxxxxxxxx
Betreff: [gnso-osc-ops] FW: Further Council Ops Procedures Concepts and
Presentation
Wichtigkeit: Hoch

Team, please see below for background, and the attached for what appears to
be the final version of the RoP for Council to vote on for public comment.
Feel free to let me know if any questions/comments.  I?ve been following the
back and forth changes in the past few days, at times offering input when
asked, and agree with Chuck that the work of GCOT has not been compromised.
What Chuck considers as ?many changes? are many people?s eyes looking at it
and sharpening up the language vs. changing anything substantive.  I think
the prevailing opinion is that the GCOT produced a quality document which
allowed people to only have to focus upon sharpening it, which is a good
thing.  To be honest, my concern was our not leaving enough time for this
part, but turns out we did :-)

 

Again, let me know if any questions.

 

Ray

 

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From: Gomes, Chuck [mailto:cgomes@xxxxxxxxxxxx] 
Sent: Wednesday, September 23, 2009 6:22 PM
To: gnso-osc@xxxxxxxxx
Cc: Ray Fassett
Subject: FW: Further Council Ops Procedures Concepts and Presentation
Importance: High

 

Here is what I hope is a near final version of the draft GNSO Council
Operating Procedures that the Council will hopefully approve for public
comment tomorrow.  Please read Rob's message below to get a good overview of
the changes that were made to the version that the GCOT and OSC had
previously submitted.  Also, note that I added one more edit to what Rob
sent at the end of Section 4.2, the last sentence.  All of the content
changes are highlighted to make it easy to see the changes.

 

Ray - please forward this to the GCOT list.

 

My apologies for the many changes but I personally believe that each
iteration has made the procedures better without compromising the work of
the GCOT.  If you have any concerns, please communicate them to your Council
reps or to me before the Council meeting tomorrow (13:00 UTC; 9 am EDT).

 

Chuck

 

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From: Robert Hoggarth [mailto:robert.hoggarth@xxxxxxxxx] 
Sent: Wednesday, September 23, 2009 2:56 PM
To: Gomes, Chuck; Avri Doria
Cc: Glen de Saint Géry; Ray Fassett; Liz Gasster; Denise Michel; Julie
Hedlund; Margie Milam; Ken Bour
Subject: Re: Further Council Ops Procedures Concepts and Presentation
Importance: High

Dear Chuck, Avri and Ray;

Per Chuck?s recent message, we have gotten General Counsel office feedback
on the suggested language changes circulated yesterday and a thumb?s up that
they look OK. 

Armed with that feedback, attached is a new document setting forth the Work
Team recommendations in a revised format.  The attached draft document
faithfully reflects the substance of the original recommendations in most
respects with just a few areas for consolidation, heading changes and
reordering of section numbers. 

The substantive changes include the suggested revised language I previously
shared, a suggested change regarding the vote for closing session and some
other obvious formatting changes described below:

Substantive suggested language changes:

1.   Number of Votes Cast ? Former Section 5.4 is now Section 4.2 and
includes the new text that Ken and I suggested yesterday.  The entire
section is shown as ?changed? in the draft document.

2.   Quorum ? Former Section 3.6 is now section 4.1 and reflects the revised
language I circulated yesterday.

3.   Open vs Closed Sessions -  New Section 3.2.  This is a new suggestion.
It struck us that in the spirit of transparency, it might be viewed as
inappropriate for a subset of the Council members present during a specific
session to close that session without some prior notice or other process and
that at the very least the default threshold of a majority vote of both
houses should be required.  The suggestion is clearly marked and can be
rejected if you think it goes too far this late in the process.

Other format changes include:

1.   Re-working the introduction and streamlining the list of links
provided.  The work team recommendations were necessarily based on the
original procedures format, but this streamlined approach seems more clear,
clean and accessible to us.

2.   Other word additions, substitutions and heading changes clearly marked
to reflect re-organizing or re-ordering.  

________

Our review of the materials over the last two days confirms the very heavy
lifting and great effort that the Work Team made under Ray?s direction and
Julie?s support!

I also like Avri?s suggestion for the operating procedures transition - to
add another line to the draft Implementation Plan to resolve the
?bootstrapping? issue.  Much cleaner than our original brainstorming idea.
Maybe, Avri, you can share that thought with the Council list and it can be
discussed during the Council meeting tomorrow.

Happy to have further email dialogue on this as necessary.

Cheers,

RobH


On 9/22/09 7:12 PM, "Chuck Gomes" <cgomes@xxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

Thanks Rob and Ken for your work on this.  I like the suggested amendments
to Sections 5.4 and 3.5 in the Draft Council Operating Procedures.  They are
consistent with the objection I communicated on the Council list to Philip's
proposed amendment.  I would like to see comments from others on the
distribution of this email message and also would like to have confirmation
that the GC office concurs with your recommendation by ASAP tomorrow but NLT
3 pm EDT.  Assuming that happens, I would like to propose the amendments to
the motion I made.

Note that I added some additional comments below.

Chuck


 

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From: Robert Hoggarth  [mailto:robert.hoggarth@xxxxxxxxx] 
Sent: Tuesday, September 22,  2009 6:40 PM
To: Gomes, Chuck; Avri Doria
Cc: Glen de  Saint Géry; Ray Fassett; Liz Gasster; Denise Michel; Julie
Hedlund; Margie  Milam
Subject: Further Council Ops Procedures  Thoughts

 
Dear Avri and  Chuck;

Ken Bour and I spent a couple of hours today going over the new  Bylaws and
the recommended Council Ops Procedures in an effort to better  understand
the issues behind the recent brief dialogue on abstentions with  Kristina
and Phillip on the Council email list AND in an effort to test and or  break
the ops processes and voting mechanisms.

As a result of our  effort, we have have come up with a number of
ideas/concepts we wanted to  float by you prior to the Council meeting.

1.   We?ve  developed some edits to the recommendations ? specifically
Section 5.4 (# of  votes cast) and section 3.5 (Quorum) that we think
address the affirmative  vote/no vote abstaining issue by providing some
more clarity to the  recommended voting procedure.  That potential
compromise language is set  forth at the end of this message.

2.   At the conclusion of  the Work Team?s deliberations, noting that the
team had focused on the  substance of each specific recommendation and not
on the overall format of the  procedures, I suggested to Ray Fassett
(copying Ray on this message) that in  preparation for the public comment
period, Staff could work on the format and  presentation of the
recommendations to make them more clear and clean. We?ve  started some work
in that regard ? not making any substantive changes,  but merely trying to
pull different sections together and consolidating common  subjects areas
(e.g., voting ) where there may be references in more than one  section of
the recommendations.  We should have a suggested format  finished for you
all to take a look at tomorrow.
[Gomes,  Chuck] Assuming they are just format changes, it seems to me that
it  would be much better to post the reformatted document for public comment
rather than the current one however it might be amended.  If there is
general agreement on that, then we should think about how best to make that
happen; I assume another amendment to my motion would be the way to go and I
will think about how best to do that in addition to the amendments to 5.4
and  3.5.

3.   We discussed the conundrum of the  incoming Council voting on the Ops
Procedures (before new voting procedures  exist).  We suggest that you
consider creating a procedural bridge  between the two Councils in which the
outgoing Council ?conditionally  approves? the new procedures as a
transitional matter (perhaps this could take  place at a ?special? Council
meeting during the weekend in Seoul) and then  have the incoming Council
ratify them as its first order of business.   The new Council could then
make changes over time as it works with and  develops some experience with
the new procedures. Haven?t discussed this with  the GC yet ? just
brainstorming.
[Gomes, Chuck] As it stands now,  I don't think there is any plan for the
outgoing Council to approve  the procedures. Do you think it is necessary?
As I believe you  understand, the plan is for the new Council to approve the
procedures  as one of the first agenda items on the 28th.  Our practice has
been  to not do official business during our working sessions on the
weekend before ICANN general meetings because not everyone can make it
there early and some people will be traveling on the weekend.  If it is
necessary, we might be able to make an exception, but it seems best to avoid
that if possible. 

4.   We have also  started to develop a a matrix/voting record spreadsheet
as an unofficial tool  for the new Chair and Glen to use for recording
votes.  The idea is to  have a clear and understandable score sheet that can
be used during votes to  easily show when voting thresholds have been met
(or not). We?ll get Glen?s  feedback on the concept and share that with you
when she is comfortable with a  draft document.
[Gomes, Chuck] Sounds great.  I would hope that  it would be a template that
allowed for live input of  votes that resulted in automatic totally of the
votes.  Is that what  you anticipate? 

We are hopeful that the language  suggested below is useful. Your comments
are most welcomed.   

Cheers,

RobH

SUGGESTED REVISED LANGUAGE FOLLOWS.  SUGGESTED CHANGES IN BOLD RED
UNDERLINED  TEXT.

In the recommended Council Operating Procedures, we  suggest some new
language to modify Section 5.4 and 3.5 as  follows:

5.4 The Number of Votes Cast
 
OLD: To pass, a motion  must attain a majority of the votes cast in each
house unless otherwise  specified in these procedures or in the ICANN
Bylaws. Abstentions count as  votes cast and shall include a reason for the
abstention.  This has the  effect of making an abstention count the same as
a  vote against except as described in ICANN Bylaws, ANNEX A, GNSO
Policy-Development Process, Section 3, Initiation of PDP.  [INSERT LIVE
LINK TO THE BYLAWS.]
 

NEW:  Unless otherwise specified in these  procedures or in the ICANN
Bylaws, to pass a motion  or other action, greater than 50% of the eligible
voters in each House  must cast affirmative votes.  For all votes taken, the
number of eligible voters in each House  shall be fixed to the number of
seats allocated in the Bylaws (a.k.a. the  denominator) and is not affected
by the number of members present or absent at  the meeting in which the
motion or other action is initiated.   Abstentions shall be recorded as
non-votes and shall include a reason. 

3.5.  Quorum
 
OLD: In order for the GNSO Council to initiate a meeting a  quorum must be
present.  A quorum is a majority of voting members, which  includes at least
one member of each Stakeholder Group. [INSERT LIVE LINK TO  BYLAWS.]
Whenever a vote is taken there must be a quorum. 

NEW: In order for  the GNSO Council to initiate a vote,  a quorum must be
present.  A quorum is a majority of voting members in each House, which
includes at least one  member of each Stakeholder Group. 

***END SUGGESTED  LANGUAGE ***