# Regen Governance Guidelines Upgrades

Regen Community is reassessing its governance process, working to formalize and update guidelines, which will be brought to a community vote of approval.

To acheive a more effective governance process, the Regen commmunity should formalize more structure and accountability within the proposal and funding process, thus supporting clarity, transparency, and an inclusive environment for participants.

Three key areas of focus and improvement have been identified in [disucussions](https://commonwealth.im/regen/discussion/10946-community-discussion-developing-regen-networks-decentralized-governance-and-community-funding-guidelines):

* Need for a **Proposal Pathway** to help guide the process a proposal takes before on-chain voting.

* Need for a **Proposal Pattern** to help ensure necessary elements are included.

* Need for a **Circular Funding Process** to improve accountability for proposals which spend community funds.**

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## **1. Proposal Pathway:**
Goal is to establish a clear pathway for proposals, with distinct stages that ensure comprehensive evaluation and community feedback is given before reaching the on-chain voting stage, facilitate the integration of idea submissions effectively and to inform decisions significantly better.

Regen has published [guidelines](https://github.com/regen-network/governance) and [resources](https://guides.regen.network/guides/network-governance/governance-basics/about) suggesting an optimal process. In addition, protocols such as Evmos have designed a [four-step progression](https://docs.evmos.community/governance/proposals/lifecycle, which includes: discussion, formalization, signal, and vote.

Synthesising current Regen guidelines and the Evmos process, Regen Community may choose to adopt the following policy for **Proposal Pathway**:

### Step 1: Socialization [Min 7 Days]

> **Goals:**
> * Informing the community
> * Determing if viable
> * Improving upon idea
>
> **Actions for proposer:**
> * Introduce the idea to the community by posting it to Regen's public forum
> * Reach out and ask for feedback from key stakeholders and groups
> * Help foster a thoughtful and respectful conversation
> * Activily participate and respond to comments and questions

### Step 2: Formalization [Min 3 Days]

> **Goals:**
> * Creating a well-fomred proposal
> * Defining outcomes, parameters, entities, actors, commitments
> * Assuring completeness
>
> **Actions for proposer:**
> * Synthesize the ideas gathaered and formalize into clear request
> * Use a [Proposal Template] to assure all necessary information has been included
> * Present formalized proposal to community for feedback
> * Optional: Create a signaling poll to guage vote

### Step 3: Implementation [On-chain Voting]

> **Goals:**
> * Submitting the proposal for on-chain voting process
>
> **Actions for proposer:**
> * Use submission tool or CLI
> * Ensure correct propsal type used

---
## **2. Proposal Pattern:**

All proposals should follow a pattern which includes key elements, to ensure all infomraion presented and for familiarity within community.

**Title:** Short yet descriptive title

**Summary** - A brief, high-level summary of what changes are being suggested. Summary should be a single sentence, or a bulleted list.

**Authors** - List of authors and contributors involved in the writing of the proposal.

**Abstract** - Abstract is a multi-sentence (short paragraph) technical summary. This should be a very terse and human-readable version of the motivation and specification sections. Someone should be able to read only the abstract to get the gist of what this specification does.

**Motivation** - The motivation section should describe the "why" of this proposal. What problem does it solve? What benefit does it provide to the Evmos network?

**Proposal Type Specific Content...**

**Forum dissucussion:** - Link to forum disscussion of socialization process.

**Regen Governance Guidelines:** Link to Regen Governance Guidelines page.

---

## **3. Circular Funding Process:**

A circular funding process aims to ensure resources are used accountably and that the community circle backs to revist funding decisions at regular intervals to determine if the project or service is delivering value and whether funding should continue.

* In principle, requests to spend community funds on product development or on providing a service should not be granted in full.
* Projects requesting funding must detail distribution stages divided into intervals marked by important milestones.
* Full amount should be divided into 4 to 6 milestones upon when each milestone is completed the project must produce a progress report and examples, which demonstrate how the milestone has been reached.
* To request the next tranche of funding, a new Community Spend Proposal must be submitted
* The new proposal should link to the original proposal, the report, and highlight the current requested funding stage.
* If requesting a full distribution, explain the need for the full amount, how the project will be held accountable.