Instructions:
o You are to attend a city council meeting (or a community organization meeting) and at this meeting take notes on what is being discussed. You will turn in these notes, a city council agenda, and a 4 page report discussing:
1) What meeting you attended, where and when it was located?
2) General information about the council. This should include the council member's names, their term lengths, and who they represent (are there district elections or at large elections).
3) What happened at this meeting? Specifically, what issues (policy proposals) were discussed? You should discuss at least 2 issues (policy proposals).
• As a word of advise, I would focus on writing about policies discussed under the "consent calendar" or "new agenda items" portion of the meeting. I would advise against writing about issues discussed during "public comments" given sometimes the public brings up topics that have little to nothing to do with policymaking and there is no obligation for the council to discuss these publicly raised issues at that meeting under state law.
4) Do you think the decisions reached on these issues (policy proposals) were acceptable or unacceptable and why? Note, if they did not make any decisions on the issue, explain how you think they should decide and why.
5) What you took away from this experience?
6) Note, throughout the paper you are expected to make connections to relevant political science concepts that you have learned in the class thus far (such as politics definitions, collective action problems, federalism, popular sovereignty, etc.).