It seems Lee actively sought to take over the operational access to the network, brought in staff outside of the existing staff process, and started exercising

It seems Lee actively sought to take over the operational access to the network, brought in staff outside of the existing staff process, and started exercising editorial control over the Freenode website. So if you mean "is there actual end-user operational impact to the network", it seems that there isn't so far, but the way Lee took over everything does not bode well and I completely understand why the existing staff resigned. When staff processes change so suddenly and abruptly, end-user visible changes tend to follow, and in any case this warrants significant loss of trust.