[council] Making Council less crazy

["Philip Sheppard" <philip.sheppard@xxxxxx>]

Background
On yesterday's call I used the word crazy to describe a part of the debate I 
heard around
the agenda item on abusive practices and the request for an issues report.
My apologies again for being late to the meeting as my day job responsibilities 
intervened.
However, I would like to clarify what I meant.
 
It is my burden to have been a member of  Council for some time and thus have a 
certain
institutional memory. I also helped write the current PDP (and advised 
strenuously against
putting it in the bylaws so that we could fine tune it every quarter).
 
What is crazy then?
I use the term in the sense of unsound. 
 
Crazy 1
A Council member requests that before an issues report we have a pre-issues 
report to
determine if the issue is in scope.
BUT the PDP  <http://www.icann.org/en/general/bylaws.htm>
http://www.icann.org/en/general/bylaws.htm tells us in 2e that one key element 
of the issues
report itself is:
"the opinion of the ICANN General Counsel regarding whether the issue proposed 
to initiate
the PDP is properly within the scope of the ICANN policy process and within the 
scope of the
GNSO."
 
Crazy  2
Even after the Council member has requested this and in advance by e-mail no 
staff member
intervenes to explain this.
 
Crazy 3
The Chair of the meeting does not rule the motion out of order.
 
Crazy 4
We debate on whether policy staff are sufficiently resourced to act on our 
request.
It is NOT the job of Council to micro-manage staff. We request what we want.
It IS the job of the Vice President, Policy Development to manage policy staff 
and tell
Council when we need to make priority choices.
 
Crazy 5
In the same light we start to negotiate with staff on the timelines in the 
knowledge that we
all know the PDP timelines are hopeless (and as mentioned above ill-advisedly 
enshrined in
the bylaws). 
Council should make its request.
Then Staff should advise on the art of the possible with respect to the request 
and other
requests. Then if necessary we advise on priorities.
 
As we move forward to revise PDP etc  lets us bear the above in mind.
And lets please empower our professional staff to advise, to act, to counsel 
and to guide.
 
Philip