[council] Status Update from PDP Feb06 Interim Chair

[Avri Doria <avri@xxxxxxx>]

As the members of the GNSO council have been informed in the past,  
due to various exigencies, the PDF Feb 06 Task force fell behind in  
meeting its scheduled deliveries.  However, because of the GSNO  
council's request to the Board that the Board delay the pending  
contract renewal decisions until their first meeting after the Sao  
Paolo meeting and because of the importance of providing GNSO input  
by the time of the Sao Paolo meeting  the TF decided to implement an  
accelerated schedule. The accelerated work plan was first discussed  
and approved by the task force members, without dissent, on 13  
September and was confirmed and implemented on 29 September.  The  
primary question that arose concerning the accelerated work plan  
during the discussion concerned the David Maher's  (Registry  
constituency) question of whether the work of the Task Force vis a  
vis contract terms was at all appropriate and should not be  
terminated as opposed to being accelerated.  The GSNO council, at its  
meeting of 28 September, confirmed to the Task Force that it should  
continue the work and should attempt to complete it as quickly as  
possible.
This acceleration plan involved creating two Rapporteur Groups, each  
of which is responsible for completing the initial work on three (3)  
of the TOR items.  Specifically:
-- Rapporteur Group A lead by Marilyn Cade:  TOR 1 (Registry  
Agreement Renewal); TOR 2 (Registry Agreements and Consensus Policy)  
& TOR 5 (Registry Data)
-- Rapporteur Group B lead by Jonathan Nevett: Report on progress  
with TOR 3 (Price controls); TOR 4 (ICANN fees) & TOR 6  
(Infrastructure and development)
Each of the Rapporteur groups recruited participants from all of the  
constituencies as well as nomcom appointees. Participation in the  
Rapporteur Groups was not restricted to Task Force or council members  
in an attempt to share the work among a greater number of  
participants. An invitation for participation was also extended to  
both the GAC and ALAC based on their liaison relationship to the GNSO  
council.  All of the Rapporteur group meetings are open.
Once the Rapporteur groups complete their October work, the plan  
calls for Task Force to consider and deliberate the proposed  
recommendations and to determine the degree of support within the  
Task Force for each of the proposed recommendations.  Once this is  
completed the Task force report will be sent to the GNSO council for  
consideration.
Based on this  parallel working method, the following schedule was  
drafted and published:
13 October -- RG A meeting
13 October -- RG B meeting

17 October -- RG A meeting
18 October -- TF meeting -- mid way review
19 October -- RG B meeting

24 October -- RG A meeting
27 October -- RGs send in finalised & collated text/recommendations

2 November -- TF meeting to discuss draft recommendations

7 November -- Release draft Task Force Report to TF members

14 November -- TF meeting to agree Task Force Report to send to GNSO  
Council
21 November -- Proposed GNSO Council call to discuss Task Force  
Report and agree next steps which would include a 20 day public  
comment period.
After public comment period is completed, produce Final Report.

Note that this schedule does take the work of the PDP beyond the Sao  
Paolo meeting, but does make the Task Force Initial report available  
to the community and the Board during the Sao Paolo meeting.  It  
should also be noted, that this 'accelerated' process, while ignoring  
the months already spent on the PDP Feb 06 discussions, attempts to  
meet the schedule for a PDP that is laid out in the by-laws.
---

On October 18, the TF held a meeting and did the midway status review  
of the Rapporteur groups as indicated in the schedule.
Each of the rapporteur groups reported that they were using a similar  
methodology in that they were creating a working document that  
contained draft recommendations based on discussion of the expert  
materials, constituency reports and other input. These  
recommendations will be subjected to a straw ballot within the  
Rapporteur Groups before being passed on to the full Task Force for  
deliberation.
Each of the Rapporteur groups reported that they were well under way  
with formulation for recommendations for 2 out 3 of the TOR items  
being discussed in the respective groups, with the third under  
discussion.  Both groups reported that they were on schedule and  
would be able to meet the target delivery date of 27 October.
There were several concerns that were brought up during the  
discussion on the status of the plan and the schedule:
1. The paper requested by the council on 28 September which would  
'compare and contrast the PDP06 Terms of Reference with the so – 
called “picket fence” consensus policy areas and provide a without  
prejudice assessment of likelihood of in or out of scope indicating  
uncertainty as necessary.' has not yet been delivered.  While not  
quite a gating factor for the work of Rapporteur Group A or B, this  
report is considered critical to the RG A's ability to make a fully  
informed recommendation on TOR 2 relating to Registry Agreements and  
Consensus Policy.
A request was to be relayed to Dan Halloran, who was unable to attend  
the meeting due to other commitments, to schedule a meeting to  
discuss the report as soon as possible.  While this meeting would not  
be an official Task Force meeting, all Task Force members, as well as  
Rapporteur Group members and Council members would be invited to take  
part in this discussion.
2. Ken Stubbs of the Registry constituency reported that the schedule  
was overly tight and that there was concern that there would not be  
adequate opportunity for a full and complete deliberation of the  
Rapporteur Group recommendations if the Task Force was to meet the 2  
week deliberation schedule and complete delivery of the report to the  
GSNO council by 14 November.
The general response to this concern was that all attempts would be  
made to schedule as much time for deliberation as possible before  
taking a measure of support on the recommendations and attempting to  
complete the Task force report.  It was recommended that participants  
from all constituencies participate as fully as possible in the  
Rapporteur group process in preparation of the recommendations coming  
before the Task Force as a whole.
3. Milton Mueller of the Non commercial consituency reported that the  
intensity of the October schedule made it difficult for participants  
to fully participate in the process.  He also asked whether it was  
possible that some of the issues might be too complicated to resolve  
on this timetable, for example the relation between fees and ICANN  
budget, and asked whether any thought could be given to separating  
some issues off into a separate policy process.
The response was that the group should try to complete the  
discussions on all issues according to the proposed schedule.  If  
during the deliberations it became necessary to separate an issue for  
further consideration and the possibility of another PDP process,  
then that action could be taken at that time.
4. Marilyn Cade of the Business Constituency mentioned a concern that  
not all of the expert opinion had been sufficiently discussed by the  
Task Force as a whole.  She offered the example of the expert opinion  
on price caps.
The response was that the Rapporteur Groups should discuss the  
specific expert opinion related to their assigned work items and that  
they should present any of the expert opinion that went into their  
recommendations to the Task Force as a whole when the deliberation  
period commenced.  It is also recommended that all Task Force members  
read the expert opinion documentation in anticipation of the Task  
force discussions.
----

Concluding note:  due to the proximity of the Task Force status  
meeting to the GNSO Council meeting - less then 24 hours and before  
the release of minutes, this status report has not been reviewed by  
any of the Task Force or Rapporteur Group members.  Additionally, it  
does not attempt to serve the purpose of minutes of the PDP Feb 06  
status meeting of 18 October, but rather tries to bring out the most  
relevant considerations.  All errors and omissions are, therefore, my  
own.
a.
Acting as Interim Chair of PDP Feb06