Context

In August 2024, the Compound Governance Support Working Group (GSWG) introduced a proposal to delegate 300,000 COMP from the Comptroller’s treasury to a set of selected delegates through the FranchiserFactory mechanism. This initiative, known as the Delegate Race, was intended to improve governance participation. 

However, after several months,GSWG intends to run another Delegate Race to increase treasury disbursement. This model has revealed significant structural risks for the DAO:

•  With New race, Delegation from Treasury will probably exceed minimum quorum voting threshold. 
•  The Comptroller held 1,578,587 COMP as of August 20, 2024. Today, its balance has dropped to 501,700 COMP. At this rate, the treasury would be completely depleted within 7–8 months.
•  Treasury tokens are strategic assets belonging to the community, intended to support the protocol in the long term (development, incentives, security). Using them to artificially confer governance power dilutes the voting rights of legitimate holders.
•  The GSWG, author of the proposal, included direct beneficiaries (Arana, PGov), which presents an obvious conflict of interest.

Problem

DAO governance is built on a simple principle: power must be correlated with actual economic risk-taking (buying underlying token). The Delegate Race(s) distorts this principle: it grants political power financed by the treasury, without being earned through capital commitment.

As a result, “natural” COMP holders see their relative influence reduced. Their governance rights are diluted in favor of actors chosen according to an arbitrary methodology.

Proposal

•  Immediately recall the 300,000 COMP delegated via the FranchiserFactory and return the tokens to the Comptroller’s full control address: 0x3d9819210A31b4961b30EF54bE2aeD79B9c9Cd3B
•  Cancel the effects of the Delegate Race.
•  Maintain the principle that governance power must derive either from: the acquisition of tokens, or participation in incentive programs explicitly validated by the community (liquidity mining, development rewards, grants) but never from discretionary allocation of treasury tokens.