[council] Report on SCI achievements

[<KnobenW@xxxxxxxxxx>]

All,

on behalf of the Standing Committee of Improvements Implementation (SCI) I 
herewith like to provide the GNSO council with the following achievements. It 
is at the discretion of the council to deal with it accordingly.

Deferral of Motions:
The SCI was asked by the council to consider the current GNSO Council informal 
practice whereby a party may request the deferral of a motion to a later date 
in those situations where a formal process for a deferral is not specifically 
provided (for example, certain deferrals are foreseen as part of the GNSO PDP, 
see http://gnso.icann.org/council/annex-2-pdp-manual-16dec11-en.pdf). The SCI 
discussed this practice and whether there was a need to create a procedure to 
formalize this informal practice. After much debate, the SCI concluded that the 
current practice of allowing for the deferral of motions was done as a matter 
of courtesy at the discretion of the Chair of the GNSO Council. For this 
reason, the SCI concluded that there was no need to create a formal procedure 
at this time. However, the SCI felt that it was necessary to explicitly state 
that there is no rule that the Chair must always exercise his or her discretion 
in the affirmative or the negative. Given that the current informal practice is 
at the discretion of the Chair, the Chair can exercise that same discretion in 
considering whether to grant or deny any request and can also exercise his or 
her discretion when determining how to handle any specific situation that may 
occur with regard to this informal practice.

Raising an Issue:
The SCI was asked to consider who can raise an issue for SCI consideration. 
After deliberating on this matter, the SCI agreed to maintain the status quo 
according to the Charter of the SCI. This means only the GNSO Council or a 
group chartered by the GNSO Council can request an item to be reviewed by the 
SCI. However, the GNSO Council could possibly consider communicating to other 
SO/ACs / individuals, that if there are issues they would like to see reviewed 
by the SCI they will need to channel these via the GNSO Council and/or a group 
chartered by the GNSO Council.


Best regards
Wolf-Ulrich Knoben

SCI Chair