At a practical level, I don't understand why the Ombudsman has no jurisdiction over staff.  His scope should be extended immediately, in my opinion.  While we work on a model for independent review of some kind.
Stephanie Perrin
On 2014-03-16, at 10:39 PM, Dan Krimm wrote:

> And wouldn't it be a thing if such grievance mechanism were not beholden to
> the Board and/or Staff for its funding and hiring authority...
> 
> Anybody think we could get something approximating an "independent
> judiciary" installed in this transition?
> 
> I have no idea whether this is realistic, but if it isn't completely
> pie-in-the-sky then it's worth pushing for.  Could this be the "least bad"
> opportunity to get something like this in place?
> 
> Dan
> 
> 
> --
> Any opinions expressed in this message are those of the author alone and do
> not necessarily reflect any position of the author's employer.
> 
> 
> 
> At 10:22 PM -0400 3/16/14, DeeDee Halleck wrote:
>> Shouldn't there be some sort of statement that the ICANN board and staff
>> processes must be accountable and transparent, with mechanism for redress
>> of grievance.
>> DeeDee
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> On Sun, Mar 16, 2014 at 9:52 PM, Rafik Dammak
>> <<mailto:[log in to unmask]>[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>> 
>> Hi Everyone,
>> 
>> (cc NCSG-PC)
>> 
>> Milton volunteered and drafted this statement regarding the NTIA
>> announcement. we should be able to discuss (commenting here
>> <https://docs.google.com/document/d/1VAkGj39ou5YkypFt0Vwqvyd1FTK31Ojm29s_gX-Ugrw/edit?usp=sharing>https://docs.google.com/document/d/1VAkGj39ou5YkypFt0Vwqvyd1FTK31Ojm29s_gX-Ugrw/edit?usp=sharing
>> ) and endorse it asap before Singapore meeting to show support and
>> indicate our initial positions . 
>> 
>> Best Regards,
>> 
>> Rafik
>> 
>> 
>> ----------statement----------------
>> 
>> NCSG Statement on the globalization of the IANA functions
>> 
>> The Noncommercial Stakeholder Group (NCSG) welcomes the 13 March 2014
>> statement from the U.S. Commerce Department announcing its intention to
>> "transition key Internet domain name functions to the global
>> multistakeholder community." We support this move because an Internet
>> governance regime that gives one national government exclusive powers over
>> a global resource is bound to be politically biased, divisive and promote
>> tendencies toward Internet fragmentation. This change is long overdue.
>> 
>> NCSG supports all 5 of the principles NTIA proposed to guide the
>> transition. We agree that the transition should:
>> 
>> * Support and enhance the multistakeholder model;
>> 
>> * Maintain the security, stability, and resiliency of the Internet DNS;
>> 
>> * Meet the needs and expectation of the global customers and partners of
>> the IANA services;
>> 
>> * Maintain the openness of the Internet;
>> 
>> * Not replace the NTIA role with a government-led or an inter-governmental
>> organization.
>> 
>> It is very important to replace the current system with a carefully
>> considered, well-designed alternative. We note that noncommercial
>> stakeholders have been leaders in developing plans for the proposed
>> transition. Submissions to the Netmundial conference from two NCSG
>> members, the Internet Governance Project and Avri Doria, have set out
>> specific blueprints for the transition.
>> 
>> Consistent with both of these proposals, NCSG proposes an additional
>> principle to guide the transition. The transition should:
>> 
>> * Enhance the accountability of ICANN through structural separation of the
>> DNS root zone management functions from ICANN's policy making functions
>> 
>> The root zone management functions, which are currently performed by
>> Verisign, Inc. and IANA under contracts with the U.S. government, are
>> clerical, technical and operational, The policy making functions of ICANN,
>> on the other hand, are highly political. NCSG believes that those two
>> aspects of DNS governance must be kept apart, in separate organizations.
>> Separating them ensures that those with policy and political objectives
>> must win support for their ideas in a fair and open policy development
>> process, and cannot arbitrarily impose them upon Internet users and
>> service providers by virtue of their control of the operational levers of
>> the global domain name system.
>> 
>> The existing IANA contract attempts to keep the two separate; however, if
>> ICANN simply absorbs the IANA and Verisign functions without any oversight
>> from the U.S. government, there is a danger that the two could become
>> integrated and intermingled in unhealthy ways. That is why the NCSG, along
>> with supporters from other stakeholder groups, will insist on this new
>> principle of separation during the transition process.
>> 
>> The Department of Commerce has asked ICANN to "conven[e] stakeholders
>> across the global Internet community to craft an appropriate transition
>> plan." Unfortunately, ICANN's management seems to have interpreted this as
>> a mandate to implement its own transition plan, in which it would simply
>> take over the IANA functions with no oversight. NCSG wishes to remind
>> ICANN that it has been charged with convening a process, not with
>> controlling it. The transition will not work unless ICANN runs a truly
>> open and deliberative process that allows the all ideas to be considered
>> and the best ideas to win.
>> 
>> NCSG is the voice of civil society and nonprofit organizations in ICANN's
>> domain name policy making organ, the Generic Names Supporting
>> Organization. It is composed of two constituencies, the Noncommercial
>> Users Constituency (<http://ncuc.org>http://ncuc.org) and the Non-Profit
>> Operational Constituencies (<http://www.npoc.org>http://www.npoc.org)
>> 
>> ----------end of statement-------
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> --
>> 
>> <http://www.deepdishwavesofchange.org>http://www.deepdishwavesofchange.org