It feels obvious to say it, but, yes, Dallas’ most influential leaders should be physically present at City Hall during meetings.
Today, the City Council is considering Mayor Eric Johnson’s proposal to require council members to attend committee meetings in person. Johnson has the right idea here, and the council should approve it. In fact, the proposal should be expanded to include not only committee meetings but also all full council meetings.
Voters pick their leaders to go to bat for them at City Hall. When council members dial into meetings virtually, it doesn’t send the right message or show the right level of commitment. We reviewed city records for 85 committee meetings last year and counted nearly 100 virtual attendances by council members.
Sometimes it’s hard to hear what virtual council members are saying. At other times, they’re visibly distracted. Our favorite is when they video in from inside their City Hall office.
Opinion
The standard of in-person attendance should extend to the most important boards and commissions too, in particular, the City Plan Commission and the Park and Recreation Board.
Even as Johnson is calling for tightening rules around in-person attendance for council committees, the council today is considering loosening those rules for the powerful City Plan Commission.
The council is scheduled to vote on a rule-change that would remove a requirement that a simple majority of plan commissioners be physically present for a quorum. It should reject that.
In all fairness, those who serve on these bodies do so voluntarily and aren’t paid. It’s a hard job and it can be troublesome for council members to find strong appointees willing to volunteer their valuable time, so we can understand the desire to make service easier.
But plan commissioners are among the most powerful unelected officials in the city. Their work frequently has an immediate impact on residents’ lives, and the work should be done in person.
One of the most common reasons residents bother to carve out time to go to City Hall and address public officials is the feeling that their homes and neighborhoods are threatened by some development or zoning change. That’s not the appropriate situation for officials to lounge around in an on-screen box, barely paying attention.
Going forward, the city should explore whether it’s doable to revert all boards and commissions to in-person attendance. For some lower-profile boards, that could be a challenge. But public city meetings should be in-person as much as possible, so it’s worth talking about.
It’s also worth talking about extending that requirement to public speakers. If council members, board members and commissioners are required to show up in person, residents should make the effort to come in person too. Written comments are always an option for those physically unable to attend.
Governing by videoconference is not the right direction for Dallas. We need to move back toward real, person-to-person interactions. In our increasingly virtual world, they’re more valuable than ever.