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RE: [council] Revised Community Travel Support Procedure for FY09

  • To: "'Council GNSO'" <council@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
  • Subject: RE: [council] Revised Community Travel Support Procedure for FY09
  • From: Alan Greenberg <alan.greenberg@xxxxxxxxx>
  • Date: Tue, 19 Aug 2008 09:54:26 -0400
  • List-id: council@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx
  • Sender: owner-council@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx


Tim, I prefixed my comments saying that this is how I read it. As Avri has pointed out, our first priority is to handle Cairo and for that meeting the issues of Liaisons is moot.

In any case, my rationale is not built solely on the numbers (I have already found and reported two errors there). The first column explicitly includes the number of liaisons. If (for an extreme example, the GNSO had 10 liaison, then that would have increased the number supported by 5. If all of that were to go to non-liaison folk, that would severely distort the intent (more than the possible rounding error of dividing an odd number does now).

In any case, I expect that staff will clarify.

Alan

At 19/08/2008 09:08 AM, Tim Ruiz wrote:
Alan,

Please review the policy again. The Additional Support column of the
chart says "Half of Remaining Council Size and Chair." Half of the
remaining Council (less liaisons and NomCom) is 9, plus the Chair makes
10. That seems to add up right to me.

The liaisons and NomCom are covered elsewhere in the policy. What the
Council has to come up with is a documented, transparent policy around
allocating the additional 10. Since support for the Chair seems to be an
automatic, that leaves 9 spots to deal with. But note the policy is
*very* clear that those spots do not have to go to Councilors (see the
sixth bullet under section 2.1 of the policy).

So I think it is perfectly appropriate to allow the Constituencies to
each have at least one spot to allocate as best fits the needs of its
members and how the use of the funds would allow it to best contribute
to the policy process. That would leave three spots for the Council as a
whole to allocate.

However, I would personnaly support giving two spots to the NCUC and
there appears to be some support for that within the RrC (ultimately,
if/when there is a vote on any allocation process I will vote the voice
of the RrC and not my own). I also suggest that any Chairs of WGs that
are active at the time be given preference for the remaining two or
three spots.


Tim


-------- Original Message --------
Subject: Re: [council] Revised Community Travel Support Procedure for
FY09
From: Alan Greenberg <alan.greenberg@xxxxxxxxx>
Date: Mon, August 18, 2008 1:15 pm
To: "'Council GNSO'" <council@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>


All of which follows is my understanding only. Alan

At 18/08/2008 03:22 AM, Philip Sheppard wrote:

>Well its good to see the maths has improved.
>In terms of allocation we very much need to decide who.
>I would suggest given the limited nature of this funding that it
>applies to only elected
>Council members.
>This thus excludes nom com (who are funded by another budget),

NomCom members are explicitly fully funded according to the new
Revised Travel Support Procedure (first sentence of 2.0 and 7th
bullet of 2.1 - the number of people funded was explicitly increase
above 50% to cover them). The NomCom appointee travel used to be in
the NomCom budget, but apparently is being moved here (or at least
the budget is presented as if it has).

> and excludes liaisons who
>should be funded by their own base organisation's budget.

The calculation of number of people eligible for funding was
augmented by the number of Liaisons (23 for the GNSO which only has
21 full Councillors), so Liaisons should be eligible for funding
under whatever rule is decided upon. But that implies the money
cannot just be divided among constituencies and NomCom appointees. In
my case, my current ALAC term is up at the end of the Cairo meeting.
Since I am a full ALAC member, I need no additional funding from the
GNSO budget for that meeting, so that money (I would guess) goes into
the general GNSO pool.

After Cairo, but before July 2010, if I am replaced as Liaison by an
ALAC member, there would presumably still be no need for GNSO budget.
If I am replaced by someone not on the ALAC, that person would be
eligible for GNSO funding (perhaps with some back-room haggling
between the ALAC and GNSO).

If the Board follows through on its plan to cut 50% of ALAC funding
in July 2010, the ALAC Liaison would presumably be eligible for at
least partial funding, regardless of his/her committee status (unless
that person was a NomCom appointee to the ALAC in which case they
would remain fully funded).

Gee, its nice to have a simple, understandable, transparent policy.

Alan

>This seems to be the basis for the budget thinking anyway.
>Given that, then in terms of subsequent allocation that should be
>done by constituency - the
>body best placed to determine need.
>
>There is of course an ethical dimension to the use of these
>limited funds that those
>parties who benefit from business opportunity as a result of ICANN
>policy may wish to
>consider before accepting funding.
>Whether this ethical dimension applies equally to the BC - as a
>function to our recently
>growing membership of domainers - is to my mind an interesting question.
>Philip





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