I appreciate this proposal and the effort to move beyond a status quo that many people seem to agree is not working especially well.
The part that resonates most with me is the recognition that ENS DAO’s bottleneck now appears to be less about a lack of ideas and more about weak coordination, diffuse accountability, overlapping structures, and unclear ownership.
In that sense, a 12-month pilot focused on clearer operational execution makes sense, (as a serious attempt to address a real problem).
I am therefore leaning supportive of this direction, but with caution.
What makes this proposal easier to take seriously is that it is framed as a bounded pilot, (not a “permanent constitutional rewrite”), and that it includes visible guardrails:
- public reporting,
- public GitHub/forum documentation,
- conflict disclosures,
- timelocks, and
- the emergency veto mechanism.
Those features matter, because:
- if ENS is going to delegate more practical coordination authority,
- then, the DAO should insist on “transparency, legibility, and reversibility”, from day one.
I also think the proposal is at least plausibly aligned with the ENS DAO Constitution.
Article III says treasury assets should first be used to:
- “ensure the long-term viability of ENS”, and,
- to “fund its continuing development and improvement”.
A coordination layer can fit within that rationale…
(at least in principle)…if it’s explicitly aimed at improving:
- DAO effectiveness,
- contributor participation,
- ecosystem programs, and
- governance execution
Ref.: ENS DAO Constitution
That said, my support is cautious, rather than blank-check support.
The main reason is that proposals like this can succeed-or-fail
- less on: their “stated intent”, and,
- more on: whether “the scope remains genuinely bounded in practice”.
This proposal would replace the current Working Group structure with:
- a single coordination body,
- give it delegated authority to allocate funding and initiate operational programs,
- and initially start with two named stewards before a third is elected.
Even with good people and good intentions…
that is still a meaningful concentration of practical agenda-setting power,
…so I think the DAO should be very clear:
- that this is “a pilot to solve fragmentation”, and,
- not “a soft path” toward “open-ended centralization”).
For that reason:
I think the most important thing is:
- not just “whether this passes”,
- but “how success and failure are defined up front”.
If the Coordination Layer is going to:
receive up to $500,000 per six months, plus steward compensation…then the DAO should expect “a very legible standard” for what improved execution actually looks like:
- more initiatives completed,
- faster follow-through,
- better contributor onboarding,
- clearer public accountability, and
- less governance paralysis.
If those things do not “improve in a visible way”,
then the pilot should not “quietly roll forward on inertia”.
So overall:
I view this as a constructive proposal and a reasonable response to a real governance problem.
I am supportive of trying a more coherent coordination model…especially since this is presented as a pilot with public oversight.
At the same time, I think the DAO should stay disciplined about keeping it “bounded, measurable, and reversible”. If this works, great. If it does not, then the DAO should be willing to say so clearly and adjust, (without treating the pilot itself as a permanent validation of the structure).