The Anchorage Assembly has scheduled a work session for July 25 titled “Worksession Draft AR for Better Public Meetings Project.” While the meeting’s time and location are publicly posted on the Municipality of Anchorage’s online calendar, there are no additional details or documents available to explain the purpose or scope of the proposed resolution. The public is being kept in the dark about what constitutes a “better public meeting.”
This lack of publicly accessible information has raised concerns among citizen observers who have noted a growing pattern of the Assembly not releasing documents in a timely manner prior to its work sessions and committee meetings.
The “Better Public Meetings Project” is a national initiative by liberals ostensibly to improve the quality and effectiveness of public meetings through the use of community-engaged research, civic engagement scorecards, and civic infrastructure assessments. Spearheaded by the left-of-center National Civic League, the project worked with select pilot communities to develop strategies aimed at creating more collaborative, deliberative, and inclusive public meeting processes…