New Election for Voting Grants

Governance
1

Background & Current Situation

  • July 2024: A six month intermediate grant programme was announced, to reward neurons that actively review and vote on critical proposal topics.
  • Grants for all four topics ultimately went to a single entity, CodeGov, largely through votes steered by the Synapse community. See all proposals listed, see results, and check VPGeek for inspection.
  • The six-month term has now ended. Instead of re-running the election, the Foundation announced a unilateral six-month extension, postponing any opportunity for the community to reassess recipients or onboard new candidates.

Why a New Election Is Needed

Concern Impact on the Network
Concentration of influence – one individual controls grants funds for all four topic Weakens decentralisation; introduces single-point risk
Material changes since July 2024 – team/individual status shifts; review quality now measurable Original votes no longer reflect current realities or proven performance
New, ready candidates - not offered a fair chance to take part Exclusion stifles competition, expertise diversity, and engagement
Healthy precedent – periodic confirmation is now part of the long-term governance design Consistency and appropriateness. A re-election falls squarely under this design
Community expectation – grants described as “up to six months” (implying follow-up confirmation) Ignoring this erodes trust in governance outcomes and procedures

Proposed Election Process (details can be adjusted as required)

  1. Call for Applications (14 days)

    • Forum thread per topic; candidates provide neuron ID, team size, qualifications, review samples, and/or voting principles.

  2. Community Review (7 days)

    • Open Q&A in the forum; candidates may amend their applications.

  3. NNS Motion Proposals

    • One motion per candidate × topic (same format as July 2024).
    • Voting window: 4 days.

  4. Selection Rule

    • For each topic, the two candidates with the highest (YES − NO) tally are elected.

  5. Grant On-Ramp & Off-Ramp

    • Existing grantees submit a final monthly report for the overlap month.
    • New grantees begin receiving funds the following month; reporting and evidence requirements remain unchanged.

Desired Outcome

  • Merit-based renewals – current holders can keep grants if they still command broad support.
  • Greater decentralisation – another chance to encourage independent reviewers per topic.
  • Higher review quality – competition and accountability drive better proposal analysis, benefiting all neuron holders.
  • Transparent, repeatable cadence – establishes the six-month review rhythm the community should expect.

Action Requested of Voters

Vote YES
if you believe the NNS should honour the original six-month commitment and give the community a timely chance to reaffirm or change its grant representatives.

Vote NO
if you prefer to accept the unilateral extension, carrying the pre-existing electees without challenge or community inspection.

15 Likes
2

Thanks for raising this @borovan, I think this is a good suggestion and I’m looking forward to see what the rest of the community thinks.

5 Likes
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This is destroying ICP why this is happening? @Jan

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Again my post’s automatically hidden - there is something very wrong here

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@darwin It is happening to pretty much everybody, don’t take it personally. There is a new ai moderation thingy they are testing out and let’s just say it needs some tweaking :upside_down_face:

Back to the topic at hand, I am shocked that this is not something that is routinely reviewed. I guess with everything else they were working on, it slipped through the cracks.

I think all the issues that have been revealed lately show how important it is to have accountability and regular reviews of who is an approved recipient of community funding.

As a side note, there is also a lot of room for improvement in the legibility of proposals. Even something as simple as always including the node provider’s name on node provider proposals. Small changes like this would make it far easier for people who are not paid to review proposals but who may be willing to invest time following what is being proposed.

9 Likes
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Also since DFINITY has given these Governance grants, they could be made public, no?

Since the ICP community members should be aware who the overseers of governance are.

We could always iterate the grant process and election process to make it better and transparent. Maybe in the future this could all be automated ( code is available, consensus must be reached without overshadowing the truth.)

2 Likes