Cardano GovTool Budget - 12 months full active maintenance and development
220 DReps voted · 66 with a rationale · 9 changed their vote · 8 re-voted unchanged
Open a row to read the rationale.
Changed votes: 4 to yes, 3 to no, 2 to abstain, together voting with 349.5M ₳ of voting power.
- Yes1.5M ₳Rationale
GovTool is Cardano’s primary governance interface, critical for CIP-1694 and Voltaire. This would ensures accessible governance, supports DReps, users...
- No1.4M ₳No rationale
- Yes1.4M ₳No rationale
- Yes1.3M ₳No rationale
- YesRevoted1.3M ₳Rationale
I vote YES on this Info Action because GovTool is essential infrastructure for Cardano’s decentralized governance. It enables ADA holders to participate in governance actions—registering, delegating, proposing, and voting
Maintaining and improving GovTool is critical for inclusive, accessible, and decentralized governance. Supporting this proposal means investing in the foundation that makes Cardano governance work—for everyone.
Earlier votes
Yes1y agoSuperseded
- Yes1.3M ₳Rationale
Gov tools is an open source backend used by many other governance interfaces, both open and proprietary. Improving Gov tools seems like a rising tide for all the governance boats in the race.
Some of the features to be added include:
- CC vote history and rationale presentation
- Drep voting history interfaces
-Support for Group / Multi person DReps - Group / Multi person proposers for on-chain actions
- Introduce CoSponsors to Crowdfund ADA for governance action deposits.
- Pre-governance polling, to gauge DRep sentiment before on-chain actions.
- Integration of AI tools to aid in translation, etc to make multi-national involvement in discussion more feasible.
I like what I see here, and while the proposed budget is larger than I would prefer, I think it will be worth it if the teams involved deliver on all these features well.
This is all new; and teams need chances to prove themselves. I am comfortable giving them a year of funding. I will make sure to confirm all these features are delivered before extending their funding next year.
- Yes1.2M ₳No rationale
- Yes1.2M ₳No rationale
- No1.2M ₳Rationale
Rationale for voting No to Cardano GovTool Budget - 12 months full active maintenance and development
Past Performance
Govtool's past performance does not justify renewed funding. While the team has responded to community feedback, the changes are not clear or proportionate to the size of the request.Insufficient Cost Transparency
The requested budget, particularly for node and indexer operations, seems high without a clear and detailed breakdown. More financial clarity is needed to assess value for money.Unclear Funding Channels
As a platform developed under Intersect, GovTool should be financed through Intersect’s Treasury budget, not a seperate Treasury Withdrawal.Low Adoption and Preference
GovTool is not the voting interface for many in the community. Funding should follow demonstrated usage and demand—not precede it. Other options replacing govtool look attractive.
- Yes1.2M ₳Rationale
I vote YES for the following reasons:
1.** GovTool remains core infrastructure:** Despite UI limitations, GovTool's API is still referenced by tools such as 1694.io and cardanobudget.com. Maintaining GovTool ensures continuity for existing services built on top of it.- **The revised budget is more transparent and cost-effective: **Compared to the previous ₳2M proposal, this version reduces the budget by 43%, introduces a tiered structure, and uses milestone-based smart contracts to improve transparency and control.
3.** Community feedback has been integrated: **After 4 weeks of consultations, the proposal now includes support for open contribution and funding for complementary governance tools — not just GovTool itself.
Supporting this proposal does not imply GovTool is perfect, but acknowledges its current role in governance infrastructure and the need to maintain it while improvements continue.
Vietnamese
Tôi bỏ phiếu YES vì các lý do sau:
GovTool vẫn là hạ tầng cốt lõi: Dù còn bất tiện về giao diện, API của GovTool hiện vẫn được nhiều nền tảng như 1694.io và cardanobudget.com tham chiếu. Việc duy trì GovTool đảm bảo sự ổn định cho các dịch vụ đang hoạt động.
Ngân sách được điều chỉnh rõ ràng, minh bạch hơn: So với đề xuất ₳2M trước đây, phiên bản mới giảm chi phí 43%, chia theo các cấp độ và sử dụng hợp đồng thông minh theo mốc, giúp tăng tính minh bạch và khả năng kiểm soát.
Tiếp thu phản hồi cộng đồng: Đề xuất đã được chỉnh sửa sau 4 tuần tham vấn, có cơ chế hỗ trợ đóng góp từ cộng đồng và tài trợ cho các công cụ bổ trợ khác – không chỉ riêng GovTool.
Việc ủng hộ đề xuất này không có nghĩa GovTool đã hoàn hảo, mà là sự công nhận vai trò hiện tại của nó trong hạ tầng quản trị và nhu cầu duy trì hoạt động trong khi tiếp tục cải tiến.
Japanese
以下の理由により、YESに投票します：
①GovToolは依然として中核的なインフラです。UXに課題はあるものの、GovToolのAPIは現在も1694.ioやcardanobudget.comなどのガバナンスツールで使用されています。GovToolを維持することで、既存サービスの継続性が確保されます。
②予算構成が改善され、透明性が向上：以前の₳2M提案に比べて、コストは43%削減され、階層化された構造とマイルストーンベースのスマートコントラクトが導入されています。これにより、資金管理の透明性と柔軟性が向上します。
③コミュニティからのフィードバックを反映：本提案は4週間の意見収集を経て修正され、外部貢献者の支援やGovTool以外のツールへの資金提供も含まれています。
この提案を支持することはGovToolが完璧であるという意味ではなく、ガバナンスインフラにおける現在の役割を認め、改善を進めながらも維持する必要があることを示すものです。
- No1.2M ₳No rationale
- NoRevoted1.1M ₳Rationale
While I deeply value the intention behind sustaining and expanding open-source governance infrastructure for Cardano, I am voting No on this proposal primarily because it fails to meaningfully integrate or harmonize with the development of Tempo.vote.
Tempo.vote has emerged as a lightweight, efficient, and highly usable interface for ADA holders and DReps alike. It demonstrates clearer design, improved delegation flows (particularly for hardware wallet users), and a stronger focus on transparency and accessibility for end-users. Despite this, the GovTool proposal does not recognize Tempo.vote as a foundational pillar in the broader governance UX ecosystem, nor does it propose coordinated development pathways or shared architecture.
Cardano’s governance tooling should be modular, interoperable, and responsive to actual community usage patterns. A continued siloed approach—where parallel tools are developed independently without shared planning, funding, or architectural coherence—risks fragmentation, wasted treasury spending, and stagnation in UX innovation.
Until proposals like this actively align with promising ecosystem tools like Tempo.vote and build toward an interoperable, composable governance UX stack, I believe treasury funding should be withheld. I strongly encourage a revised proposal that recognizes Tempo.vote not just as a dependent or adjacent application, but as a core strategic component of Cardano’s governance infrastructure.
Earlier votes
No1y agoSuperseded
GovTool is not fully open source. We should instead be supporting open source initiatives.
- Yes1.1M ₳No rationale
- No1.1M ₳Rationale
From a strategic governance perspective, this proposal to continue funding GovTool’s active development and maintenance raises significant concerns regarding the fragmentation and duplication of governance infrastructure within the Cardano ecosystem. While GovTool undeniably plays a critical role as an open-source, community-owned interface facilitating on-chain governance participation, the coexistence and overlap with other platforms—most notably tempo.vote—cannot be ignored. This parallelism risks diluting user engagement, confusing stakeholders, and ultimately weakening the unified governance experience that Cardano must strive to deliver.
The proposal’s emphasis on GovTool’s modularity, open APIs, and broad ecosystem integration is commendable; however, it insufficiently addresses the strategic imperative of consolidation. The Treasury resources allocated here—up to ₳1.15M annually—represent a substantial investment that must be justified by demonstrable efficiency gains and a clear roadmap toward interoperability or unification with other governance tools. The absence of explicit plans to harmonize GovTool with tempo.vote or to rationalize overlapping functionalities leaves the community vulnerable to redundant expenditures and operational inefficiencies.
Cardano’s governance strength lies not only in decentralization but in coherence and scalability. Supporting multiple competing governance frontends fragments the community’s attention and complicates the user journey, undermining the inclusivity and accessibility that Voltaire envisions. It is imperative that the Governance Tools Working Group and the GovTool Consortium prioritize strategic alignment with existing platforms, fostering interoperability standards or even converging development efforts to create a singular, robust, and user-friendly governance interface.
Moreover, from a business-minded stewardship standpoint, we must scrutinize the proposal’s tiered funding structure and ensure that every tranche of expenditure directly contributes to sustainable and scalable governance outcomes. While the modular approach and community feedback integration are positive steps, they do not substitute for a comprehensive strategic framework that safeguards the Treasury and maximizes long-term value for Ada holders.
In advancing Cardano’s governance infrastructure, we must reject proliferation in favor of strategic consolidation. The future stability of the protocol and the vitality of its community participation depend on decisive, coordinated action to unify governance tools. Therefore, I support funding GovTool only on the condition that the proposal includes a binding, transparent roadmap for integration or harmonization with tempo.vote and other governance platforms. This is non-negotiable if we are to preserve Treasury resources, enhance user experience, and uphold Cardano’s scientific and decentralized governance ethos.
I firmly believe that governance tools must empower and unify, not divide, our community. It is time for us, as stewards of Cardano’s future, to make strategic choices that protect our treasury and build a truly scalable, coherent governance ecosystem—one platform, one vision, one Cardano.
- Yes1.1M ₳No rationale
- Yes969.9K ₳No rationale
- Yes966.3K ₳No rationale
- Yes951.2K ₳No rationale
- Yes929.9K ₳No rationale
- Yes927.7K ₳No rationale
- Yes920.9K ₳No rationale
- Yes888K ₳No rationale
- Yes884.5K ₳No rationale
- Yes866.3K ₳No rationale
- Yes829.9K ₳Rationale
This proposal has our full support. GovTool is an indispensable public good for the Cardano ecosystem, crucial for fostering accessible and fair governance for every participant. Unlike commercial ventures, GovTool is an open-source, community-built platform, designed to be reused and expanded upon by the community. While this collaborative development demands more time and coordination, it is unequivocally the right approach for a decentralized ecosystem like Cardano.
The proposal provides a meticulous breakdown of costs for 12 months of work across all environments (Dev, QA, Preview, PreProd, Mainnet), clearly explaining fund allocation and offering historical cost data for complete transparency. This funding is vital to ensure GovTool remains a stable, community-owned hub for participation. Furthermore, the commitment to return any unused funds to the treasury demonstrates exceptional fiscal responsibility. For these compelling reasons, we consider this a fair and absolutely necessary proposal that significantly strengthens Cardano's ability to govern itself.
- No827.8K ₳No rationale
- Yes765.6K ₳No rationale
- No760.2K ₳No rationale
- Yes742.6K ₳No rationale
- Yes663.8K ₳Rationale
We, the Dutch DRep, vote YES on the Govtool budget proposal by the Govtool consortium.
Transparency Disclosure: One of our Dutch DReps represents Dquadrant, a Govtool consortium member, in community forums. While this relationship informs our understanding, we believe the proposal stands on its own merits and advances Cardano’s governance goals.
The Govtool consortium—coordinated through Intersect and backed by trusted community teams—has a proven track record of delivering accessible, constitutionally sound governance tools since CIP‑1694. Their proposal is transparent, well‑structured, and firmly rooted in Cardano’s principles of accountability and community‑driven decision‑making.
Govtool’s planned enhancements will:
Guarantee open access for all ADA holders, lowering barriers to participation.
Foster community ownership through open‑source code and public APIs, enabling developers to build complementary governance solutions.
Support a distributed development model by funding multiple teams and encouraging community contributions.
Ensure the roadmap remains responsive to ADA holders’ needs via transparent, community‑driven prioritization.
Together, these improvements will strengthen Cardano’s decentralized governance, boost transparency and efficiency, and align with our long‑term vision of inclusivity and innovation.
- Yes657.3K ₳No rationale
- Yes637.5K ₳No rationale
- Yes636.4K ₳No rationale
- Yes604.7K ₳No rationale
- Yes591.1K ₳No rationale
- Yes579.1K ₳No rationale
- No574.2K ₳No rationale
- No573.2K ₳No rationale
- Yes564.6K ₳No rationale
- Yes559.7K ₳No rationale
- Yes550.1K ₳No rationale
- Yes479.2K ₳No rationale
- No478.5K ₳Rationale
GovTool is essential for DRep onboarding and CIP-1694, but its request, 1.5 M ADA for a single year of maintenance and incremental UX work, far exceeds what I consider reasonable at this stage.
After already approving ~280 M ADA of this year’s 300 M ADA NCL, I believe tighter fiscal discipline is critical. To signal the need for a leaner, better-justified budget, I will vote NO on this proposal and encourage a scaled-down resubmission.
- Yes466.2K ₳No rationale
- Yes433.2K ₳No rationale
- Yes393.6K ₳No rationale
- No379.5K ₳Rationale
No! This budget is much too large for the little that has been delivered so far and especially in comparison to other tools that provide the same, often even better functionality in governance portals as well as just as additional functionality of wallet apps. It's just not worth it. This is an example of a project that has grown way out of reasonable proportion when everything was centralised at IOG and Intersect. Let's scratch that!
- Yes371.7K ₳No rationale
- Yes371K ₳Rationale
I am voting YES because this proposal strengthens an already functional and essential governance platform—GovTool—through clear, community-led improvements.
It enhances user experience and reliability based on real feedback, and introduces dedicated development across key governance areas: proposals, delegation, voting, outcomes, and budget discussions. It also adds full end-to-end testing and continues to follow an open, transparent development model.
GovTool is vital for inclusive governance—without it, participation risks becoming fragmented or limited to closed systems. This proposal ensures continued access, usability, and clarity for all Ada holders.
The platform’s open-source nature offers ecosystem-wide benefits. Its code and APIs are already used by other tools, and ₳250k is earmarked to support external contributors and open governance tools building on it.
Funding is structured through tiered levels and smart contracts, ensuring transparency, cost-efficiency (nearly 50% lower than earlier proposals), and responsible allocation. Unused funds will return to the Treasury.
For these reasons—continued platform improvement, increased governance efficiency, and ecosystem-wide open-source value—I strongly support this proposal and vote YES.
- Yes366.6K ₳No rationale