A Proposal to Merge NCSG, NCUC and NPOC for More Efficiency in ICANN=?UTF-8?Q?=E2=80=99s_?=DNS Work

[Rafik Dammak]

hi all,

while I don't have comments yet about the proposal, I can share some
details about travel support and add information to share background:

Travel support
* Regular support
1- There are 6 travel slots for NCSG representatives to GNSO council. I
think in terms of budget, they are assigned to GNSO council not NCSG per se
but still any elected councillor gets to attend the 3 ICANN meetings and in
the last 3 years the GNSO Council SPS meeting.
2- 3 travel slots to each group (3 for NCSG, 3 for NCUC and 3 for NPOC). I
believe they are given to excom like for other stakeholder groups and
constituencies. 1 slot on each group goes to the chair in practice.
3- There is also 1 for NCUC nomcom representative for ICANN meetings and
other nomcom F2F meetings.
4- CROP travel slots for outreach and that  program went through several
changes (I cannot recall the exact number) . It is only available to NCUC
and NPOC and as far I recall it doesn't cover a whole ICANN meeting if a
slot is used for that purpose.

* Ad-hoc or temporary support
Other travel support to NCSG representatives (appointed directly or
indirectly by NCSG)
  - travel support to any NCSG representative appointed to specific review
teams  (ATRT, SSR RT, RDS RT, CCT) to attend their F2F meetings. The number
of slots varies as the appointment to those review teams go through GNSO
council.
  - there was travel support for NCSG representatives to CCWG and CWG for
their F2F meetings. Things are also evolving and we need to take into
account the possible future of PDP WG. With PDP 3.0 and what was done with
EPDP in terms of a representational model for WG, future PDPs might be
different from what we had before. For example, we have 6 representatives
to the EPDP team and there was a budget for that WG to have F2F meetings,
the representatives could participate in those meetings with the travel
support. It also covered subject to approval ICANN meetings too when there
were EPDP sessions. That can be the case or not  in the next PDPs initiated
by GNSO in future. PDP 3.0 indicates that requesting resources and specific
support should be done at the chartering phase.

There is also a GNSO pilot project to support WG leadership (chairs, vice
chairs, subgroup leaders) and I believe some of our members benefited from
it. It is not targeting NCSG but it is another opportunity for active
volunteers.
With covid-19, F2F meetings remain uncertain even if the proposal from
ICANN to go back to meetings is to start first with WG or other groups
small F2F meetings.

There are other important kind of support:
- we have admin support with Maryam , for the 3 groups. In case of having
only NCSG, she might continue with some time allocation but also assigned
partly to other community support decided by ICANN org .
- we have membership database support, for each group. it should be checked
if that will continue and to which level.

Other possible resources are on demand basis and subject to approval: the
additional budget requests in every fiscal year to fund specific activity
, requested by NCSG, NCUC or NPOC and subject to approval by ICANN (finance
team with consultation with others relevant department). This shouldn't
change because of any restructuring as it depends on the nature of
requested and proposed activities to be funded.

I hope that clarifies and gives ideas about what the group gets as support.

Best,

Rafik

Le dim. 12 juil. 2020 à 11:38, Tomslin Samme-Nlar <mesumbeslin at gmail.com> a
écrit :

> It is also possible that we could break these issues into smaller ones and
> deal with them in phases.
> For example, it may be quicker to solve the issue of funding by looking at
> a rework of the travel/funding policies of the stakeholder group and its
> constituencies to increase focus on policy work than waiting for a merger
> before looking into the issue.
>
> Cheers,
> Tomslin
>
>
> On Sun., 12 Jul. 2020, 06:11 Arsène Tungali, <arsenebaguma at gmail.com>
> wrote:
>
>> Good point!
>>
>> On Sat, Jul 11, 2020, 8:47 PM James Gannon <lists at icann.guru> wrote:
>>
>>> I certainly would like to support work on this going forward, with the
>>> caveat that I would like to see any work on this being focused strongly
>>> around reducing the amount of administrative positions we have to a minimum
>>> and instating additional support roles dedicated to actual real policy work
>>> on the ground. We are far too heavy on regional and administrative roles
>>> that are unrelated to our policy work, whereas refactoring that to diverse
>>> policy roles with clear roles and responsibilities and accountabilities to
>>> deliver on policy work, be that policy and position papers, active work on
>>> PDPs or other similar outcomes related measurements. If we don’t frame any
>>> such structural change around that goal set then we will be doomed to just
>>> repeat the situation we are already in, just under one banner.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> ---
>>>
>>> *James Gannon*
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> *From: *NCSG-Discuss <NCSG-DISCUSS at LISTSERV.SYR.EDU> on behalf of
>>> Stephanie E Perrin <stephanie.perrin at MAIL.UTORONTO.CA>
>>> *Reply to: *Stephanie E Perrin <stephanie.perrin at MAIL.UTORONTO.CA>
>>> *Date: *Saturday, 11 July 2020 at 19:19
>>> *To: *"NCSG-DISCUSS at LISTSERV.SYR.EDU" <NCSG-DISCUSS at LISTSERV.SYR.EDU>
>>> *Subject: *Re: A Proposal to Merge NCSG, NCUC and NPOC for More
>>> Efficiency in ICANN’s DNS Work
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> First, I would like to thank Sam for his thoughtful and thorough post
>>> which started this discussion.  It is long overdue, in my opinion.
>>>
>>> As Sam indicated, our history show that we have had quite a bit of
>>> friction and fruitless arguing over the arrival of NPOC and the
>>> readjustment of the former NCUC and the new NCSG to include the new
>>> constituency.  NPOC itself has gone through a fair bit of soul searching as
>>> it developed its new Charter.  I am personally very happy that the current
>>> management team, Joan Kerr, Bruna Santos, and I have got along very
>>> amicably and cooperated, particularly during this last difficult year.  I
>>> think it has helped engender the trust and thoughtful discussion that might
>>> actually allow us to talk about the pros and cons of this "merger".
>>>
>>> As Raymond pointed out, however, NCSG as the overall body which elects 6
>>> councillors to the GNSO, already exists.  Any councillor represents NCSG,
>>> not his or her chosen constituency.
>>>
>>> I had intended to advance on this discussion during my tenure as NCSG
>>> Chair, but circumstances have not favored the introduction of such
>>> discussions. However, we are now facing a dramatic re-imagining of how
>>> ICANN is going to do business, and potential travel restrictions for a long
>>> time to come.  It is a great time to talk about different ways of being a
>>> successful stakeholder group, and perhaps developing different roles for
>>> some of our elected leaders, rather than simply repeating administrative
>>> functions.  This is particularly important, given the scarcity of
>>> volunteers actively working on policy issues.  I will put together a google
>>> document with pros and cons, as Dorothy suggested, and post it to the list.
>>>
>>> Thanks to Raph for digging out more correct numbers, I will check the
>>> membership lists and get back to you all with the precise numbers.
>>>
>>> Stephanie Perrin
>>>
>>> NCSG Chair
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> On 2020-07-11 10:49 a.m., Raphael Beauregard-Lacroix wrote:
>>>
>>> Hi all,
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Just for the record, all in all ncsg is in the 800 members range,
>>> including orgs and individual members. But I see that we need to update
>>> certain public-facing pages in that regard. It's been noted and will be
>>> acted upon as far as NCSG is concerned.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> I'm also looking forward to a plan regarding Sam's proposal, that aligns
>>> identified issues and their proposed solution. Like many others I'm not
>>> against a merger, on the contrary rather. But it would necessarily be a
>>> long process, and it must be one carried forward by a group of dedicated
>>> members and not by the ECs as ECs (and maybe not even by EC members as
>>> individuals, depending on charter language). Not only is this a charter
>>> requirement like James pointed out, but it is also a long-term legitimacy
>>> requirement.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> And it must be a process that will aim to solve concrete issues we are
>>> facing. For example: if we have a problem with allocation of travel
>>> support, a big merger in itself will not solve this, but changes to the
>>> travel support policy of SG and Cs will.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Have a nice weekend,
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> On Sat, Jul 11, 2020, 10:02 James Gannon <lists at icann.guru>
>>> <lists at icann.guru> wrote:
>>>
>>> In the last election we had 240 voters. Of which I would estimate 15%
>>> are actually involved in any work.
>>>
>>> Sent from my iPhone
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> On 11 Jul 2020, at 14:53, Sam Lanfranco <lanfran at yorku.ca> wrote:
>>>
>>> 
>>>
>>> Dorothy, et. al.,
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> I could be way off on membership. Better indicators are active
>>> participation and voter turnout.
>>>
>>> The ICANNWiki pages for NCSG, NCUC are one or two years out of date.
>>> NCSC claims 500 members
>>>
>>> The NPOC ICANNWiki page is up to data and links to a list of 100
>>> members.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Not counting those who are just NCSG members we are in the 600 claimed
>>> member range.
>>>
>>> Without diminishing the heroic work of NCSG/NCUC/NPOC volunteers, that
>>> still leaves us a
>>>
>>> weak leg on the ICANN multistakeholder stool.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Sam
>>>
>>> ---- Original Message ----
>>> *From*: dorothy g <dgdorothydg at GMAIL.COM>
>>> *To*: NCSG-DISCUSS at LISTSERV.SYR.EDU
>>> *Sent*: Sat, Jul 11, 2020, 9:29 AM
>>> *Subject*: Re: A Proposal to Merge NCSG, NCUC and NPOC for More
>>> Efficiency in ICANN’s DNS Work
>>>
>>> I agree.  If someone could help us with a table of pros and cons
>>>
>>> I was also surprised that the total membership is only around 300?
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
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