Frank,
We do not have a full answer to your question but some points have emerged. One is that Publisher ID and authorship are not the same thing. Another (which it is clear you agree with) is that we really do not want the ID to be directly from someone unable to give approval for use. To make this more clear, we think it is acceptable to name that person in the ID, e.g.
PublicDomainWorkOfOriginalAuthorName/pacletname,
but not acceptable to just do
OriginalAuthorName/pacletname.
As for authorship, in the Wolfram Function Repository we tend to use either of the below styles:
Contributor (original work by <original author's name>)
or
Original author (additional contributions by <submitter's name>).
I hope this provides some guidance.
