Subject: IAOC Request for community feedback

From: The IAOC <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 22 Oct 2012 16:49:41 -0700

The IAOC is requesting feedback from the community concerning a
vacancy that the IAOC feels is not adequately covered by existing IETF
rules.

Marshall Eubanks has been a active IETF participant for many years and
a member of the IAOC since 2009. However, he recently stopped
participating in the IAOC and Trust. The IAOC has made extensive
efforts to contact Marshall about this, but has not received any
response. Given the size of the IAOC, a missing member makes it much
harder to get a quorum. The specifics of his absence include:

- Missed the IAOC calls on 11 October 2012, 10 September 2012,
   6 September 2012, 23 August 2012

- No email received from Marshall since 1 August 2012 on the IAOC,
   IETF Trust, and related private lists.

Marshall is subscribed to the IAOC and IETF Trust lists and
consequently should have received email discussing regular
IAOC/Trust business including email on this topic.

We have tried to contact Marshall over this time period using email 14
times, telephone 6 times (leaving messages), SMS messages seven times,
Linkedin messages once, Facebook messages once, and registered postal
mail twice. We have not received any response from Marshall. It is
also our understanding that Marshall has stopped participating in
other IETF lists and stopped working on IDs he authored.

On 6 September 2012 the IAOC appointed a replacement liaison to the
IETF NomCom after learning from the NomCom chair that Marshall had not
responded to emails from the NomCom chair.

Based on all of this, the IAOC has concluded that Marshall's IAOC position
is vacant.

The IAOC has reviewed BCP101 and concludes it does not handle this
case very well. BCP101 says that if "an IAOC member abrogates his or
her duties" the recall process in BCP10/RFC3777 may be used. The
specific text is:

   IAOC members are subject to recall in the event that an IAOC member
   abrogates his or her duties or acts against the best interests of the
   IETF community. Any appointed IAOC member, including any appointed
   by the IAB, IESG, or ISOC Board of Trustees, may be recalled using
   the recall procedure defined in RFC 3777 [RFC3777]. IAOC members are
   not, however, subject to recall by the bodies that appointed them.

   If a vacancy occurs among the appointed members, this is filled by
   the appointing body for that position according to its procedures.

The conditions for determining that a vacancy exist are not well-defined.

BCP10/RFC3777 (Section 7) defines a process where a recall petition is
signed by 20 NomCom qualified IETFers, the petition is sent to the
ISOC President, the ISOC President appoints a recall committee chair,
the chair follows normal NomCom procedures to select 20 committee
members (this includes a public call for volunteers, max of two per
organization, random selection of volunteers, etc.), recall committee
investigates, recall committee votes and requires a 3/4 majority to
pass the recall.

We think this process was not intended to be used when a sitting IAOC,
IESG, or IAB member vacates his/her position. We believe that the
intended use of this process was for determining whether a member
should leave a position who is unwilling to leave and who has harmed
the IETF. That is clearly not the case in this situation, to the
contrary, we would have preferred Marshall to continue. It doesn't
seem appropriate in this case, or when an member is unable to
participate due to illness or death.

The IAOC believes that it is reasonable to declare Marshall's IAOC
position vacant and, therefore, to ask NomCom to fill his position for
the remainder of his term (~15 months.)

The IAOC is requesting feedback from the community whether it is
reasonable to declare Marshall's IAOC position vacant. Responses are
solicited by no later than 5 November 2012. If there is not community
support for this approach, the IAOC will pursue the BCP10/RFC3777
recall petition path because having a missing member for 15 months
significantly effects the operation of the IAOC and IETF Trust.

Please send your comments to <[email-masked]>.

The IAOC and IETF chairs will review the community feedback and make a
determination if there is support for declaring the position vacant.

I would add that we all feel very badly for Marshall given his many
years of service to the IETF. We really don't understand why he is not
responding and are concerned about it. Unfortunately, we don't know
what else to do given his lack of response to our many attempts to
contact him.

Bob Hinden
IAOC Chair

p.s. A draft is in progress that proposes an update to
BCP10/RFC3777 similar to what we propose here to handle how cases of
vacancy be handled. The issue applies to the IAB, IESG, and the IAOC.
An announcement will be sent when that is available.