As a seasoned journalist who has sat through literally thousands of public meetings that were being held by municipal, county, state or federal councils, committees and groups of various kinds, I can tell you without a doubt they can be as boring as staring at a rock.
The common refrains among reporters, young and old, that have, more often than not, been forced to cover those meetings in order to receive a paycheck comes down to two basic whines:
“Well, there’s four wasted hours of my life that I will never get back” and “God so loved the world he didn’t send a committee.”
Amen.
Excuse me a moment while a shiver in remembrance of spending at least one-third of my life in such public gatherings.
OK. I’m OK. That’s was close. Where was I? Oh, yes ... Nevertheless, those tedious meetings are the very foundation of our most basic and most critical levels of self-governance in America.
They guarantee us the right to go before a local governing body of our land to help determine our daily fate and the destiny of hundreds of our fellow citizens who live next door, down the block or across town.
Where would we be without that basic example of our world-envied democracy? I cannot imagine.
A critical part of our nation's foundation is rooted in such gatherings.
In today’s world, however, cutting out three, four or five hours of your day or evening every other week to sit in a chair listening to other people discuss what is often some pretty mundane stuff, can very often be flat too much to ask in our busy existence.
That’s why one of the most important innovations in self-governance in the last 60 years is the ability for all of us to sit in the comfort of our homes and watch what our elected officials are doing while we eat dinner, yell at the kids and race to get the dog outside before there’s a mess to clean up.
All over the country you can simply punch the buttons on your TV remote a couple of times a month and watch people act on your behalf, or listen while other citizens urge those members to take action for the public good.
And, if you’re really lucky, you might hear a public official getting yelled at and chewed on by your next-door neighbor.
Democracy, just like reality TV, can sometimes be fun to watch.
Luckily for Lawton citizens, the city council meetings are regularly live-streamed and made available on Facebook. If you’ve watched those sessions while sipping a cold one from the comfort of your home, you could have seen discussions where buying the old Fairmont Creamery were hammered out.
You might have watched as Lawton Mayor Stan Booker and council members discussed the ongoing Coronavirus pandemic that has dramatically impacted Ft. Sill, our state, America and the entire world.
You could have been privy to discussions about recent issues that voters went to the polls and approved.
You could even discover that the guy who lives in that rundown house across the street from you with the grass that looks more like a ready-to-harvest field of wheat is about to get fined or have his place condemned for making his neighbors live next to a dump.
However, not all residents in southwest Oklahoma are able to tune into their council meeting. From Elgin to Medicine Park, Cache to Hollis residents must attend meetings in person.
It isn’t cheap to set up a live television set and produce a show. It takes time, knowledge and money.
Many of our small towns have joined with their larger neighbors and closed their city halls and are encouraging social distancing.
Some of them have taken to live streaming their meetings on social media.
Perhaps when we shed ourselves of this virus and get back to normal, municipal leaders will contine to make their meetings accessible to all.