Essay On City Council Meeting

Washington DC is the capital of the United States of America and the home of the president´s country, it has the majority of the political scene but contrary to other opinions, there are others scenes that we can appreciate, for example, culture, architecture, entertaining, and restaurants.

On Monday, April 13th, 2009, I visited the Culver City city council meeting, and found that they operate using a council-manager form of government. For a city with a population of about 38,000, this type of governmental structure is fairly common, and I was not surprised to see it in action in a community where the median household income is around $56,000 a year. Culver City is also a culturally rich community with a 60 percent Caucasian population, and a quarter of the residents are either of African American or Asian decent. The mayor, D. Scott Malsin, is one of five members on the council, and his term as mayor is on a rotating basis. Having been to a Hermosa Beach city council meeting with a similar council-manager structure, I knew

One thing of significance that I learned about at the city council meeting was meeting procedure. When I first arrived a pre-meeting workshop about annexation was occurring. After the regular meeting began we started with the Pledge of Allegiance. Next roll call of the council members was taken. Dallas Center has five council members: Mike Kidd, David Bagby, Kurt Pion,. Following roll call was an action to approve the agenda, which was approved. Next up was public communications and concerns. I was surprised that each person only has two minutes to talk about all the issues they

I thought the meeting was professionally conducted. The meeting respected the schedules of the participants, followed the agenda, and ended the meeting on time. Everyone at the meeting spoke in a professional manner and using appropriate language, and all had the respect for each other. When one speaks, everyone listens attentively.

For my community meeting assignment, I attended a Green Lake County Board meeting. I have never attended a County Board meeting before and I found it to be quite interesting. I found this meeting posted on the Green Lake County website and that is where I pulled the agenda from to take to the meeting. The meeting was about one and a half hours long.

Of course, during meetings, many questions are sure to arise about the same factors. Most people want know what will be done on roadway conditions, what will be done about the cleaning of the parks, etc. One of the biggest, and very surprising, issues brought up recently by the Common Council is a chicken ordinance for Warsaw. In a unanimous vote, the Warsaw Planning Commission has given their approval to allow chickens within the city limits. However, the Council voted “no” on the ordinance that, if passed, would have allowed a select number of residents to raise and maintain chickens on their property inside the city

The experience going to the council meeting was great and I would imagine that the items on the agenda had a great deal to do with that. The topics I found the most interesting revolved around public nudity, serving alcohol in public, spending grant money, a gun ordinance, and polling the public about being taxed. The agenda item revolving around public nudity took up most of the time. Currently, Eureka doesn't have a ordinance in place to give police authority to arrest citizens who are nude in public when it isn't a sexual act. The chief of police gave example of a person doing Tai Chi in a public park nude. The police were called and couldn't do anything short of asking him to put his clothes on. There was concern among a few council members

The council then reviewed past topics, such as the billing process for water and sewer services, improvement projects at Memorial Park, and more streetlight installations throughout Raymore. As for the process of passing a bill, the bill was first thoroughly explained by the council, then the mayor asked who supported the passing of this bill. Once the votes, for and against, the bill had been counted and announced by the mayor, the bill was then announced as a new policy. All four bills went through this process and were approved. Then there were four new bills introduced that discussed topics like the unofficial election results, a contract provided to Dayco Painting Inc to work on interior painting of administrative areas, a contract given to Holiday FX to put up Christmas lights on City hall, and an amendment to the city manager’s employment contract. The voting process was the same as before, and all bills ended up being approved, but the Holiday lights bill had a little bit of opposition to it because of the cost it takes to put up the lights. The council then opened the floor for public comments, in which those who decided to speak had to first state their full name and address for the record, like the personal appearance in the beginning of the meeting. I went up and made a public comment about the Holiday lights bill. I stated that is was a good idea because it showcases our city and would be a great gathering place for our city. The council communications

The meeting had an agenda that was published two days in advance per required by california state law. It was followed religiously by the council without deviation. They called the meeting to order and when everybody was quiet they started with the flag salute/presentation of the colors. They had the system of nominating ideas and seconding them to vote. They were speedy about it and there was no hesitation. However, out of the five city council members only three of the individuals so while the voted to vote they moved almost all of the votes to the next meeting when there would be more Council members.

On September 9, 2014 I attended the Glendale City Council meeting which was held at the Council Chamber which is located on the 2nd floor of the Glendale City Hall, Room 200, 613 East Broadway, Glendale, California. The meeting commenced at 6 p.m. and lasted for approximately 1 hour and 40 minutes. Several policy proposals were made and discussed in this particular meeting. This paper is aimed at discussing the various policy proposals made and debated at this meeting with a view to establishing whether they are acceptable or unacceptable to the Glendale electorate. It is, however, essential to provide a brief background of the City of Glendale before embarking on a discussion of policy proposals.

Discussion of local government is a subject where eyes glaze over and information floats in one ear and right out the other. Most citizens know in greater depth about national politics rather than local, even if the city government has a greater influence and impact on daily life. With the permission of Professor Duckworth, I watched Frisco Independent School District’s board meeting online (link provided, pg. 4). The school board meeting explained a lot about the process, organization, and the structure of local politics.

One way to see public administration in action is by attending a city council meeting, whether it be in an urban or rural area, public administration still has a part in each event. As Kettl (2018; p. 244) referenced in his book, there is not a civil system that would be sustainable without strong leadership. This paper will discuss the author’s description, observation, and reflection during a city council meeting.

The Dahlonega City Hall was crowded on the evening of March 1st 2010. The seats were full, except for at the very front, and the standing room was filled almost out the door. The crowd, mostly made up of students, leaned in to hear as the voices of the City Council members faded in and out of the faltering sound system. The six City Council members and the mayor sat along a bench as if they were the judges at a hearing. Because of the ongoing discussions and the crowd, I thought I had arrived a few minutes late; but I was able to find a seat in the front two rows. Despite how packed the small room was there were plenty of empty seats in the front. I had thought the meeting was well on its way by the way conversation was going and

The meeting continued with the Joint Consent Calendar, the consent calendar is a grouping of routine matters to be acted on in one motion. There were six items considered and recommended actions taken anywhere from issues related to utilities to professional services. At the end of this presentation it was open to public hearing providing any concerned resident an opportunity to speak. This was followed by consent ordinances which city staff members began to speak about Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) and its draft citizen participation plan for years 2015-2019. This was followed by an ordinance for the Civic Plaza which would limit the use of skateboards, bicycles, and leashed animals during special events held at this location. Following these issues the council would make a decision which would be placed on record for public view. New business was proposed where an approval of long ranged property management was projected, but they motioned to push this event forward to the next meeting due to the absence of a council member who was more familiar with the issue.

I chose to attend a city council meeting for this assignment and was very surprised at what I witnessed. The city council served an important purpose and the meeting actually accomplished many important goals. Among the interesting things that I saw at the council meeting were the people who attended, the people who presented, the people who sat on the council, and the subjects that were being voted upon in the meeting.