Proposed NL 6-4: Bill to Establish a Citizenship Commission

[Samantha Fuller]

If Mizou is actualy seated in the RA as the CARE representive then the concern is moot. What I was worried about was seting a precident.

[Beathan]

The citizenship commission is moving forward. I would like to offer the following points for consideration.

1. Should we allow citizenship by citizens who do not own their own CDS land to be citizens by virtue of an association with a CDS group or another CDS citizen? If so, on what terms, with what conditions, and with what limitations?

2. Should citizenship be specific to the Sim (such that people are NF or CN citizens), or should there be no sim-specific citizenship?

3. Should citizenship be a condition of an SL avatar, or a RL person? (Can alts be citizens?)

4. Should citizens have to demonstrate personal commitment to and involvement in the CDS? (For example, should citizens be obligated to pay their own fees -- or can another person pay those fees on the citizen's behalf.)

5. How can we encourage immigration of skilled and active new citizens?

6. Should financial contribution be the only basis for citizenship -- or should be offer alternative ways people can become citizens (such as service to the community)?

7. What rules should be have for loss of citizenship?

8. What rights should be protected incidents of citizenship?

There is a lot of meat on these bones.

Beathan

[Pelanor Eldrich]

The following are personal opinions and do not represent the views of the DPU faction.

[quote="Beathan":14txcppz][b:14txcppz]
1. Should we allow citizenship by citizens who do not own their own CDS land to be citizens by virtue of an association with a CDS group or another CDS citizen? If so, on what terms, with what conditions, and with what limitations? [/b:14txcppz][/quote:14txcppz]

Yes, I believe the existing conditions of 5-9 allow group owned land whereby the group owner's portion must be greater than or equal to 128m2. I would like to see the group owner pay his/her portion of tax individually to the Treasurer. I would further extend citizenship to landless avatars who pay a poll tax. In the poll tax scenario all citizens pay the equivalent of the cheapest 128m2 as poll tax. Landowners also pay (land use fees - poll tax). Some potential citizens don't want or require land. Some can't find available land.

[quote="Beathan":14txcppz][b:14txcppz]
2. Should citizenship be specific to the Sim (such that people are NF or CN citizens), or should there be no sim-specific citizenship?[/b:14txcppz][/quote:14txcppz]

Citizenship should be federal, i.e. CDS wide citizenship. Residency in a particular sim or franchulate would be important for local elections (if applicable).

[quote="Beathan":14txcppz][b:14txcppz]
3. Should citizenship be a condition of an SL avatar, or a RL person? (Can alts be citizens?)[/b:14txcppz][/quote:14txcppz]

RL individual only. Our constitution is founded on the UDHR and not Raph Koster's Declaration of Avatar Rights. We do not want multiple citizens controlled by a single RL person. RL identity verification is a problem which can be solved technically using 3rd party solutions (Simon Beckham) or using LL verified accounts.

[quote="Beathan":14txcppz][b:14txcppz]
4. Should citizens have to demonstrate personal commitment to and involvement in the CDS? (For example, should citizens be obligated to pay their own fees -- or can another person pay those fees on the citizen's behalf.)[/b:14txcppz][/quote:14txcppz]

Citizens should be obligated to pay their own fees. At present, there's no way to verify that a "sponsor" didn't pay the citizen money required to pay tax. However, at least the warm body must put the cash in the Treasury box each month. Citizens in the guild or civil service can be paid for their labor thereby rewarding service with citizenship.

[quote="Beathan":14txcppz][b:14txcppz]
5. How can we encourage immigration of skilled and active new citizens?[/b:14txcppz][/quote:14txcppz]

Events and retail encourage traffic which promotes an atmosphere where new citizens will want to join. The more tourists we have the more potentially active citizens we might recruit. It would be nice to have paying jobs and a good retail climate to attract new citizens.

[quote="Beathan":14txcppz][b:14txcppz]
6. Should financial contribution be the only basis for citizenship -- or should be offer alternative ways people can become citizens (such as service to the community)?[/b:14txcppz][/quote:14txcppz]

See above. We have a number of civil service and possibly guild related contracts that pay the modest amount required to be a CDS citizen.

[quote="Beathan":14txcppz][b:14txcppz]
7. What rules should be have for loss of citizenship?[/b:14txcppz][/quote:14txcppz]

A penal code should specify which offenses are bannable and which strip citizenship without ban. Surely contempt of court and failure to comply with SC sentences. We have a summary ban by the Chancellor followed by due process by the SC. Only the SC adjudicating a case should be able to permaban someone.

[quote="Beathan":14txcppz][b:14txcppz]
8. What rights should be protected incidents of citizenship?[/b:14txcppz][/quote:14txcppz]

The UDHR should be upheld. Rights granted by the constitution and the codes should also be upheld. The constitution, codes and local bylaws are three mechanisms by which new rights might be introduced and upheld.

[Bromo Ivory]

One thought about the Citizenship -

It seems to me that one of the original goals of CDS was to create a self sustaining community in a SIM that outlives the founder - so how can we be more inclusive - and avoid a dissipation of meaning and community? (The builds are so gorgeous, that I think residents will be found - but you want to make sure there is some sort of a commitment as well! Though the makeup might be changed - especially due to the low prim nature of a lot of the city's lots - one can wonder if some are owned solely for the vote? And if they could sell up - who would buy them?)

I agree that this is not a time to be too conservative - it was a unique radical (for SL) vision that made the place what it is today - and the questions on how to make CDS more inclusive is a discussion that is definitely due.

One big positive is that if things are done right (and I have no idea of the right thing), it will have a pool of citizens driving SIM development harder - and the expansion and investment available could be invigorating an already vigorous community!

If it is handled incorrectly - you could see a lot of people drift out of CDS with no common interest and commitment to the community.

This will be an interesting discussion - and I have no idea of my feelings about this charter as of this morning!

[Bromo Ivory]

I woke up this AM with an idea - I also am posting this simultaneoulsy to the nice discussion in CN.

If someone wants to be a citizen, how about having them "buy in" to CDS with at least the minimum amount (equiv of 128m^2 of land) and then the "tier" on it. Some of the money could be used towards buying land as soon as new SIMS would open up. And the people who were landless would get a vote on the SIM they may occupy?

This would change the "debt" cycle of CDS, get people more involved, and also steer development in the manner they want - and maybe enhance the budgets to allow more and faster development!

Just a thought.

[Gwyneth Llewelyn]

I'm always afraid of contributing to these threads, since people might get the wrong impression that I'm usurping other people's ideas and/or endorsing/favouring one over the other, but...

Take a look at how Linden Lab runs their Premium service. You pay a monthly fee, and are entitled to hold land for 512 m2 without paying additional land use fees (but you have still to [i:3gcadyhb]buy[/i:3gcadyhb] it first). You can hold more land if you wish — by paying additional land use fees — but you're a Premium account, no matter how much land you own. Also, the first 512 m2 you own are "free" of any fees; you only pay those if you own more than 512 m2.

Citizenship in the CDS [i:3gcadyhb]could[/i:3gcadyhb] be handled that very same way. You'd pay a "citizens' tax" that allows you to hold up to 128 m2 of land free of additional fees, but you'll pay it every month, no matter if you actually own land or not. You get all citizens' rights while you're paying your citizens' tax every month. If you want to buy a plot of 128 m2 (or if finally one becomes available), you won't pay any additional fees for that, only for everything you hold over those initial 128 m2.

Group land ownership becomes a moot point related to citizenship that way. You can hold land in a 100 different groups, so far as your land, all added up together, doesn't go over the 4096 m2 limit. To calculate how much group-owned land you actually own, all groups used for holding land in the CDS would be required to publish all members, and the total amount of land held by the group would be divided by the number of citizens listed there. Ideally, of course, only citizens would be part of the group; enforcing that bit of potential legislation will always be tricky, though.

This method works rather well for LL's definition of "Premium" accounts, so it should work for us to define citizenship.

The issue of landowners vs. landless citizens is better addressed by having the landowners voluntarily congregate towards a "pressure group" — an association of landowning citizens — that would make their demands heard to the RA (or to the parties running for election), much in the same way the Traders' Association tries to protect existing merchants and lobbies for more resources for them.

[michelmanen]

Brillliant! This is exactly the open, inclusive, growth-oriented, forward-looking, creative and progressive approach CARE was looking for -AND entirely consistent with the way SL itself works, thus easy to explain and justify to both current and future citizens.

In the original bill submitted by CARE, the Commission's mission was to "Inform, Educate, Debate, Listen and Report". The first two tasks, vital in my opinion, were deleted from the final Bill. This was a mistake. Citizens should have been informed of the major issues connected with citizenship in the CDS and educated about the major choices available to them (to draw a parallel, in the same way that the sim contest was first based on a regional master plan allowing citizens to constructively focus their proposals, narrow the variables to be addressed and make the proposals fit in a coherent, long-term development plan for the region). A notecard with these issues and choices should have been e-mailed to all citizens so as to stir their interest and make them realise the critical importance of this debate.

This can still be done. Beathan, for example, posted a cogent list of issues on this thread which, once agreed on be the Commission and the RA, could satisfy the "Inform" part of the Commission's tasks; Gwyn's vision of CDS citizenship could constitute one of the options under consideration, as could the Pat/Sudane proposal, and the Pelanor suggestions (also posted on this thread) -with, of course, the currently in force citizenship rules as the baseline (Claude's "do nothing") option. These could be structured into a matrix showing and comparing the key items of each proposal as a function of the issues identified earlier, thus meeting the "Educate" portion of the Commission's tasks. Citizens would be able to understand what is at stake in this debate, contrast and compare various approaches and options to citizenship, and provide informed and educated opinions and arguments -including new options nad alternatives not figuring in the matrix ("Debate"), which the Commission would gather ("Listen") and provide in a summarised form to the RA, together with its own conclusions and recommendations ("Report").

[Beathan]

Gwyn --

Your idea is a great one. The only hurdle I see is a potential land shortage. Unlike Linden Labs, the CDS cannot simply add more land. Bringing in a new sim is an arduous task, unless we sacrifice the quality of our builds, which we should not do.

However, I think that we can plan around this. We can have dedicated land in all new sims (and possibly in our current sims through land reclamation) dedicated to "citizen plots." We could give these to landless citizens, who would be placed on a waiting list, as they come available.

A second potential downside is that such a system could create (or emphasize) class differences and disparities in the CDS. The landless citizen plots could be perceived as a slum or skid road. I do not think that this is inevitable. I also recognize that, even now, we have different sized lots that impose different costs of citizenship on their owners without any such divisions. However, I think we should be mindful of the issue and attempt to avoid it.

Beathan

[Bromo Ivory]

[quote="Beathan":30sskt2t]Gwyn --

Your idea is a great one. The only hurdle I see is a potential land shortage. Unlike Linden Labs, the CDS cannot simply add more land. Bringing in a new sim is an arduous task, unless we sacrifice the quality of our builds, which we should not do.
[/quote:30sskt2t]

Given how few people spend most of their time online in the SIM, I am not sure how much the landed/landless dichotomy will create class structure any more than someone with a 128m^2 lot will be thought of as "lesser" than someone with 4096m^2? I am new here, so I really don't know if these divisions exist - I am happily oblivious if they do, given my village lot!

If handled correctly - a "buy in" along the lines of Gwyn's might allow CDS extra advanced funds to buy more SIMs a little faster than the current method. Meaning if the fiscal details were structured properly, more money would be available sooner rather than later. And with more citizens, there would be more people willing to "float" the CDS money.

And given we have a master plan, we could have a contest that covers, say, 2 SIM's worth of stuff - or simply expand the existing ones quicker and ask for "exactly how" to do it?

[Aliasi Stonebender]

It's an interesting idea, although I'm not entirely sure the economics work out.

One reason the Premium account works is due to the increased stipend - and now, increased tech support. I'm wondering if we're overestimating the benefits of the project as we did with businesses and a base of law - is being allowed to throw parties at the Biergarden really worth the fee?

[Sleazy_Writer]

[quote="Aliasi Stonebender":2egb41u0]is being allowed to throw parties at the Biergarden really worth the fee?[/quote:2egb41u0]
and that fee is not all: Beer in the Biergarten costs money, which goes to Kendra from [url=http://slurl.com/secondlife/Funadama/12 ... 0:2egb41u0]Neu[/url:2egb41u0][url=http://forums.neufreistadt.info/viewtop ... 7:2egb41u0]Evil[/url:2egb41u0]burg

[michelmanen]

fg

[Gxeremio Dimsum]

I like what I'm seeing here. It's some of the best and most practical discussion on a longstanding issue that I've seen in a while.

I would propose that it be possible, like with LL, to pay for a quarter or a whole year in advance, perhaps with discounts. Since the current process is not automated, and there's no easy way to check your account, it might make the process easier from both the collection and paying ends.

Other than the SLNN office, I see no reason to own land in Nstadt - it adds nothing to my enjoyment of the community. I heartily endorse Gwyn's proposal to detach citizenship from required land ownership.
Gxeremio