Community Polling on Funding Model ZIPs

Governance
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Dear Zcash Community,

We have important decisions ahead that will significantly impact Zcash’s governance and sustainability. After many months of calls for proposals and discussions, we are at a critical decision point.

Collaboration and cooperation among Zcash organizations and ecosystem partners is essential for determining the path forward. In this spirit, @Alex_ZF (interim Executive Director of the Zcash Foundation), @aquietinvestor (Executive Director of Shielded Labs), and I have been meeting to explore potential solutions. Together, we have agreed to poll the community to gather feedback and gauge sentiment on the proposals received prior to the deadline provided below.

The current funding mechanism, established under ZIP 1015, expires in November 2025. At that time, funding will no longer be available to ZCG or others doing critical work supporting the protocol and ecosystem. Without a proactive decision, the absence of funds for grants post-expiration poses a significant risk to the continuity of Zcash’s development efforts. This underscores the urgency for a long-term solution.

The community will be asked to decide whether to prioritize extending the Dev Fund and adopting a new funding model, which will further delay NU7. The length of the delay is uncertain and depends on the specific proposal, as different proposals would have varying impacts on the timeline and feasibility of implementation.

Polling will begin in April and include coin holders, the Zcash Foundation ZCAP, and the ECC ZAC.

For inclusion in the poll, proposals must be formally specified in a draft Zcash Improvement Proposal (ZIP). A guide and template for drafting a ZIP are available here. If you would like help drafting a ZIP, please reach out to the team in the ZIP channel in the R&D Discord. If you draft a ZIP for consideration, please provide a link in this thread.

Key Dates:

  • March 31st: All draft ZIPs for inclusion in polling are due
  • No later than April 17th: Polling begins
  • May 1st: Polling Ends
  • No later than May 5th: Results shared and next steps identified

While posted by me, as per above, this post was created in collaboration with Alex and Jason. We welcome your feedback! Please reply to this post or feel free to reach out to any of the three of us with any questions or concerns.

The following are the current proposed ZIPs for consideration along with AI-provided summaries:

Community and Coinholder Funding Model (C&C)
Owners: @joshs

This model allocates 8% of block rewards to Zcash Community Grants (ZCG) and 12% to a Coinholder-Controlled Fund, active until the third halving (around November 2028). It gives the community and coin holders distinct decision-making powers, with coinholder voting requiring 420,000 ZEC for approval of grants. The model aims to decentralize governance, ensure flexibility for future changes, and prevent funding gaps post-2025, while excluding changes to protocol governance.

Community-Governed Funding Model
Owners: @Dodger

This model allocates 8% of block rewards to Zcash Community Grants (ZCG) and 12% to a ZCAP-Controlled Fund, managed by the Zcash Foundation through the Zcash Community Advisory Panel (ZCAP). It prioritizes community consensus, decentralizes decision-making, and ensures accountability, with a 50% participation threshold for ZCAP voting. The model addresses the funding gap, secures funds in a multisig wallet, and maintains flexibility without changes to ZCG governance or protocol governance.

Pure Coinholder Funding Model
Owners: @peacemonger, @joshs
This model directs 20% of block rewards to a Coinholder-Controlled Fund, managed exclusively by coinholder voting. Active until the third halving, it requires 420,000 ZEC for grant approvals and aims to decentralize governance by giving coinholders primary control over funding decisions. It addresses the November 2025 funding gap and secures funds in a multisig wallet, without changes to protocol governance.

Pure ZCAP Funding Model
Owners: @Dodger

This proposal allocates 20% of block rewards to a ZCAP-Controlled Fund, managed by the Zcash Foundation through the Zcash Community Advisory Panel (ZCAP). It ensures community consensus and decentralization by requiring a 50% participation threshold for ZCAP voting. The model focuses on giving the Zcash community greater control over funding decisions, addresses the funding gap, and secures the fund in a multisig wallet overseen by key Zcash organizations, without altering protocol governance.

Zcash Governance Bloc (zBloc)
Owners: @joshs, @daira

The zBloc proposal creates a decentralized governance model where 20% of block rewards fund a Zcash Community Fund, split into Large and Minor Grant pools. The governance structure includes constituencies like Coinholders, ECC, ZF, and others, each with adjustable voting power. The model aims to prevent centralization, support community preferences for non-direct funding, and remain flexible for future governance and funding decisions. It allows for adjustable thresholds and voting units, ensuring long-term sustainability without altering the structure of ZCG or protocol governance.

Supporting ZIPs:

The following ZIPs were created in support of a number of the proposals above:

Deferred Dev Fund Lockbox Disbursement (owners: @daira, @nuttycom, @str4d)

On-chain Accountable Voting (owners: @daira)

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Like the “community” of people getting money out of the dev fund would elect not to keep the money flowing.

Another sham poll. I though you had the back of ZEC holders @aquietinvestor.

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I do. I’m currently organizing a test poll using the new Coin Voting 2.0 application to help coinholders understand how it works so that it can be used to gauge coinholder sentiment in these governance discussions. I also support proposals that give coinholders a role in funding decisions through a coinholder-driven grantmaking process.

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I may misunderstand something then, apologies if that’s the case.

Could you please tell me the weight of the tokenholders vote in this poll?

If anything less than 100%, can you tell me how that number was decided and what makes the people behind this decision legitimate?

Likewise, what makes the participants other than ZEC holders, not just legitimate, but just as importantly, free of conflict of interest?

As far as I can tell there’s only one way to fix the mess ZF and ECC got us into, and it’s not even a big ask. I’ll repeat it in case it’s not clear to anyone:

  • ZEC holders need to have control over the dev fund.
  • This does not imply that ZEC holders should decide specifically where the money should go.
  • This does imply that ZEC holders would have control over whether the proposal made by the “ZF/ECC community” is worth the expense for them.
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There’s no formal weighting assigned to coinholder input or any other input. Coinholders, ZCAP (managed by ZF), and ZAC (managed by ECC) will each be polled separately. The results provide insight into sentiment across different groups, but there’s no predefined formula for how each input is weighted.

Some of the current proposals give ZEC holders control over a portion of the Dev Fund. For example, the Community + Coinholder proposal allocates 12% of block rewards for coinholders to decide how and when the funds are distributed. That said, there’s nothing stopping anyone from introducing a proposal that gives coinholders 100% control over the Dev Fund. If that’s something you’d like to pursue, I’d be happy to help you formalize it into a ZIP so it can be considered alongside the other proposals.

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No. You see, it would be giving legitimacy to this sham poll.

No legitimate poll deciding of a critical aspect of the project would have “no formal weighting” that would lead a decision based on “sentiment” that undefined people would define once the vote is over, with participants that are deep in conflict of interest.

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CEO token. Ever wondered why the ZEC price was so low? Credibility.

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How does this work exactly? You propose something and want someone else to do the work?

Please, if you really felt this way, you would have already sold. The grand standing is very entertaining.

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who is going to pay for Zcash development and Legal work?
are we ready to delay POS, ZSA and zcashd deprecation, for few more years?

give alternative plan, if you are pushing for changes like this

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I like that you’re thinking my only wallet is the one I have made public.

If you move forward with this, I hope your financial plans include Zcash getting back below $18.

Keep fighting against ZEC holders, this will definitely make Zcash successful.

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How does this work mr. doze? Please share your solution. You are great at pointing out flaws and have yet to offer any solutions. Until you answer this, I can’t take anything you say as anything but grand standing, one wallet or not.

We are all trying to figure this out, I think.

I want ZEC holders to have a voice, which is precisely why I have been spending time setting up new software to test and potentially use. This is new, needs testers, and few are willing.

I’m happy you have a lot of time and money and hold ZEC, honestly, but what else can you offer besides constant complaints?

Less talk, more work.

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Have you ever, directly or indirectly, received funds from the dev fund?

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I think its clear as part of ZecHub I have, and do.

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Excellent, you are deep in conflict of interest.

If you are authorized to vote, it’s only proving how much of a sham this vote is.

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You have two choices:

  • Offer a solution and work on it
  • Exit

This isn’t complicated. I understand you might disagree with Zcash’s setup but you do have options. I am trying my best to help improve things, for better or for worse.

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  1. Absolutely, a partial exit is not out of the cards. Are you sure you want that?

  2. You, a person on the receiving end of the dev fund, are not in a position to tell me that I need to work on something.

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Of course I don’t, but you seem hell bent on not working and creating a wealth purity test.

At least you’re honest about it. :-1:

This seems fundamental, we will probably never agree with this. I wish you the best and hope you find what your looking for.

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Anyways, if anyone has arguments to counter the statement above, I’d love to read that.

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The integrity of the poll, suggesting that it is flawed and untrustworthy due to lack of proper weighting, reliance on biased sentiment about who is making decisions, and the presence of conflicts of interest among participants. Is understandable what ZIP you dislike the only way to help this problem is to correct it by contributing with the Zcash community and I’m all ears.

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The way forward is very simple and does not require much work at all.

The current problem is not a lack of ZIPs or lack of technology. The current problem is a governance process that is deeply flawed and three CEOs that are colluding to quickly and quietly (most ZEC holders have no idea what is going on) organize a poll in a way that is completely illegitimate given what it is attempting to achieve.

You want to move forward in a legitimate way, it’s easy:

  1. Warn ZEC holders on wallets that a critical vote is coming and details are to be found $here.
  2. Poll ZEC holders in a few easy ways we know how to; technically both transparent and shielded can be polled without problem.
  3. Results are binding.

That’s it, there’s nothing else to do.

And we’re done.

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