Inaccuracy in describing current conditions in a problematic proposal

[Avri Doria <avri@xxxxxxx>]

Dear Sirs,

In a first reading of the proposed 'procedure', there is one glaring  
omission in the description the Current Travel Support to ICANN  
Meetings.  The consequences of that omission makes for a problematic  
proposal, one which I hope the board does not accept as currently  
writen.
While it mentions the Nomcom itself, it does not mention the Nomcom  
Appointees to the various SO councils under the current situation,  
though some Nomcom Appointees are subsumed in the Board and ALAC  
descriptions.  The original and current position is that the Nomcom  
Appointee as outside volunteers to ICANN are provided with full   
support for travel on the same basis as the Board, including business  
class support for longer journeys.
To omit even the history of this practice and just to bury the mention  
of the elimination of Nomcom Appointee travel as a type of its own in  
the future policy description, is a severe deficit in the proposal.
If ICANN wishes to remove Nomcom Appointees from its meetings, it  
should not appoint them.  It should not back door the removal of  
Nomcom Appointees by removing their support. Not even admitting to  
having provided that support is an extremely cynical approach to the  
issue.
Any new travel 'procedure' must continue to cover Nomcom appointees on  
the same basis as it covers Board members and this support must be in  
addition to any level of support granted to the SOs for travel.  To  
not do so, helps to delegitimize ICANN by making a fiction of the  
legitimizing notion that ICANN brings outsiders into its policy making  
process - rendering the policy making process more like that of a  
insider's club.  To include that support within the category of SO  
travel is problematic as it would allow for an SO chair to decide that  
the outside voice of the Nomcom Appointee was disruptive toward the  
insider's plans and thus eliminate that voice entirely by disallowing  
travel.  I do not think this is an option that ICANN should enable.  I  
also do not think that the impression that ICANN policy making is  
being entrenched of ICANN in the hands of the insiders is one that  
ICANN can afford to make in the period before further JPA  
considerations.
I would further like to state that the lower level of travel proposed  
for SO members is an insult.  It basically says that their efforts are  
worth less then the efforts of the Board or of the staff.  The SO  
members spend many hours beyond their regular jobs giving pro-bono and  
unbillable time to the effort of making consensus policy for ICANN.   
For the ICANN staff to decide that this work is worth less then the  
work of the Board is not only wrong, but very insulting to all those  
people who put effort into making ICANN policy.  If ICANN cannot  
afford the business class level of support for all of its volunteers  
and staff, then it should not provide it to any of them. It should not  
be making a decision that one volunteer is more important then another  
or that staff are more important then some of the volunteers.

Avri Doria
Nomcom Appointee
GNSO Council Chair