jackiedoherty.org

News, schools, and views from a uniquely Lowell perspective
29th February 2008

Behind closed doors?

posted in Local Politics |

Did you watch breathlessly to see the results of the residency requirement vote at the City Council meeting on Tuesday night?  If so, you were disappointed (or relieved, perhaps). After all the brouhaha over the residency requirement, it got shuttled off to subcommittee without debate or discussion.  This begs the question:  who is on the subcommittee and when do they meet?  The first part of the question is easy since all the subcommittees are listed on the excellent city website.  (The Personnel Subcommittee to whom the motion was referred is chaired by Kevin Broderick with Bill Martin and Jim Milinazzo as members.)  Subcommittees meet as necessary, so it is a little more tricky to find out when a particular topic will be handled.  When I called the office of the City Clerk they didn’t have any information about when this subcommittee would be meeting or whether or not it would be televised.  As we said before, all city council and school committee subcommittee meetings are open to the public.  But if the public doesn’t know when they are meeting, it effectively puts the meeting ‘behind closed doors.’ 

This gets back to a pet peeve of mine about the overuse of subcommittees.  It lets debates and decisions happen out of the public eye. The effort to televise these meetings is ongoing and important.  There needs to be a public record of what is happening in an elected body that is outside the regular, more public meetings.  This holds true for the city council and the school committee (see list of school subcommittees on related page).  Let’s pay attention, people, and see what our leaders are doing when we’re not looking.

 

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