Participation in Discussions Regarding Conflicts for publicly-archived meetings (was Re: Conflict of Interest policy, 1 March 2012 draft)

[Bradley M. Kuhn]

>> * *Participation in Discussions and Votes Regarding Conflicted Matter.*
>> A conflicted PLC Person shall not participate in or be permitted
>> to hear the PLC's or PLC sub-committee's discussion of the matter
>> where he or she has a conflict of interest, except to disclose material
>> facts and to respond to questions. The conflicted PLC Person shall
>> not attempt to exert his or her personal influence with respect to
>> the matter, either at or outside the meeting.

Chris Leonard wrote at 21:42 (EST) on Thursday:
> our PLC discussions are held in an open IRC forum and openness is a
> philosophical position within our project.  Can we narrow this
> restriction for PLC members to "participate" while allowing "hearing"
> on an equal footing with all project members?

Tony and I came up with the following change which we think addresses this
issue:

  * *Participation in Discussions and Votes Regarding Conflicted
  Matter.* On a matter in which a PLC Person has a conflict of interest,
  the conflicted PLC Person must abstain from, and must not hear nor
  read the pre-vote discussions of the matter by the PLC or PLC
  sub-committee, except to disclose material facts and to respond to
  questions. The conflicted PLC Person shall not attempt to exert his or
  her personal influence with respect to the matter, either at or
  outside the meeting.  The conflicted PLC Person may read minutes
  and/or logs of the matter's discussion after voting is complete.


This change allows the conflicted PLC Person to "disclose material facts
and to respond to questions", but does not allow them to actively otherwise
participate in discussions until a vote occurs.

One thing we still want to prevent is the conflicted person being a full
participant at the meeting.  For example, the conflicted person being
present in real-time at an IRC meeting then back-channeling to non-conflicted
parties would defeat the purpose of the clause, so we didn't want to
soften so much as to allow that activity.

Does this change address your concern?
-- 
Bradley M. Kuhn, Executive Director, Software Freedom Conservancy