Z�calo Public Square :: Make Your City Council Meetings Feel Like a Starbucks: Would your community be better off if your city council met at the local Starbucks?
The answer is almost certainly yes. Compared to people in other states, few Californians talk to their neighbors and work together with them to solve local problems. But the most natural forums to meet with neighbors on community challenges—local meetings of the city council or school boards—aren’t designed to encourage conversation among citizens.
Walk into a council chamber or school board meeting room in your town, and you’ll likely see rows of chairs facing some sort of raised dais or stage, where the council members or board members sit. (Check out images of city council meetings around L.A. County here.)
The whole point of the setup is to have you look at the politicians, not your fellow citizens. Essentially, city council chambers are laid out like church, and, as in church, you’re not supposed to talk too much. So it’s not surprising that fewer and fewer Americans bother to go to city council meetings (or, for that matter, to church).