Re: [council] FW: Voting Remedies due to Absencer

[William Drake <william.drake@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Hi

On Oct 28, 2010, at 1:03 PM, Stéphane Van Gelder wrote:

> 
> Thanks for forwarding this Chuck. I think Avri's email makes a lot of sense. 
> I agree that the rules should not be so cumbersome as to force the Council to 
> spend more time and effort on admin stuff to the detriment of policy issues. 
> I have stated several times that I found the current DOI rules we are trying 
> to work to overly cumbersome, and also voiced my opposition to the way the 
> proxy rules were interpreted recently as they stopped both an RrSG and an 
> NCSG councillor from voicing their vote.
> 
> I also share the worry that staff should become "rules enforcers". It is up 
> to Council leaders to enforce the rules, working with the Council.
> 
> I do hope we can streamline the rules so that the sound theory and good 
> intentions that went into elaborating them does not stand in the way of the 
> practical sense needed to apply them in our everyday work.

I agree with Stéphane and Tim that the proxy rules seem cumbersome and unduly 
restrictive.  As with the DOI, we should have had a more probing discussion at 
the Council level before voting, but there's no reason why we can't course 
correct now.

>> 
>> On 27 Oct 2010, at 23:47, Ken Bour wrote:
>>> 
>>> 3)      There are two important proxy requirements that are addressed in 
>>> the online form: 
>>> a.      For each motion that is scheduled to come up for vote, the 
>>> "Appointing Organization" must have established an affirmative or negative 
>>> voting position per its Charter provisions; and
>>> b.      For each motion, the "Appointing Organization" must affirm that is 
>>> has directed the Councilor serving as proxy how to vote.


Do I understand correctly that the AO as a whole must have a unified position 
one way or the other in order for a Councilor's vote to be given to colleague, 
otherwise it is penalized and loses the vote?  Maybe that's ok for any AO's 
that only allow their Councilors to vote as specifically directed; no 
agreement, no direction, nothing lost.  It would not be ok for AO's that allow 
their Councilors to exercise judgement and do what they think is right, and 
hence may not have a singular position.  In this case, the absent Councilor who 
should have been able to give her/his proxy to a colleague and say please vote 
xyz loses the vote for no reason.  

On Oct 27, 2010, at 11:47 PM, Ken Bour wrote:

> In the specific case of the NCSG, Staff notes that the “Appointing 
> Organization” differs between the Board appointees and those Councilors who 
> were elected by the NCUC.   For Mary, Bill, and Wendy, a voting remedy would 
> have to be authorized by the NCUC Chair (or designated officer); whereas, for 
> Rosemary, Debbie, and Rafik, there is a footnote in the GNSO Operating 
> Procedures which stipulates that they are considered to have been appointed 
> by the NCSG.   

Ok…So we are not quite NCSG in this context…?

The NCUC charter says Councilors may "assign their vote by proxy to the other 
Constituency GNSO Council Representative for all calls and meetings for which 
he/she cannot be present, with or without specific voting instructions."  And 
the Interim Charter the board gave NCSG, which presumably is über alles, says 
only that a Councilor "elected or appointed pursuant to this Charter shall be 
subject to the rules, principles, responsibilities, and duties as set forth in 
the Charter of the Constituency that originally nominated him/her for election 
to the Council," which for us elected types would be NCUC.  So then we three 
can individually assign our proxies to each other and exercise proxy votes 
irrespective of whether our AO has established an affirmative or negative 
voting position?  Or do the OPs trump both the NCUC and the NCSG charters?

I should never try to grok the OPs after a long day….

Bill