I knock the city council for many things . . . but they are light years ahead of the county board in one important area.
My major concern with the city is just getting their agendas out on time, but their legistar system which they have had since 2005 and their on-line materials are far superior (tho the county is working on it! Thanks County Clerk Scott McDonell) Generally speaking, they are more transparent and communicative and there have been on-going improvements with much thanks to Scott Resnick as they try new technology – often not without objections and road blocks from the city attorney’s office.
Another emerging issue with them is that they are trying to figure out what to do about a couple of mentally ill people who come and testify regularly off topic. I say big deal, it takes 3 minutes, let them talk and move on.
And I think they could make their budget schedule a little bit better so you don’t get amendments on Friday for a Tuesday meeting – but at least you can find everything on their website. This is particularly true at the Board of Estimates
Anyways, contrary to my last post, the city, in order to communicate their intentions have put out a press release, I got the press release forwarded to neighborhood listserves from two different alders and I expect I will see it from a third plus I got an alert from an alder’s updates on the city website. I’m sure more will do it as well. I am guessing they will even put notes on their agendas to clearly indicate what the rules are – and that if something comes up last minute, they will suspend their rules and let people speak to tat one issue.
I think both bodies have improvements to make, but the city is much, much further along . . . the attitudes are a bit the same at times, neither group loves public input, but the city alders complain a whole lot less about it, perhaps because they deal with so much more
