Jurado 1

Kaylee Jurado
Mr. Buescher
Government, Period 1
29 February 2016
City Council Meeting Evaluation
On February 9th, 2016, I attended a Vacaville City Council meeting along with some of
my peers. At this meeting there was roughly forty people in attendance, and it ranged from boy
scouts, people of the Chamber of Commerce, some other involved members of the community,
and about fifteen to twenty Buckingham students. This meeting was very short in comparison to
some of the other ones students have gone to in the past, it was less than an hour long. First we
did the pledge of allegiance and then Mayor Len Augustine got the meeting started.
The first issue that was discussed was about water conservation. Someone went up and
discussed with the council members ways we could be saving water. The second issue had to do
with housing. The third issue was a personal issue that the police responded to. A man who was
claiming the police and the government were against him. After the man had been rambling on
for a while Mayor Augustine stopped him, and told him that this was a matter he could discuss
with the Chief of Police John Carli. The man then left to go talk with the police chief. This man
seemed to have some issues mentally and the council handled this issue very well and heard the
man out and then turned him to the Chief of Police so he could further discuss the matter.
The fourth issue was the Chamber of Commerce Annual Report. The Chamber of
Commerce improves and teaches business skills in the community. They also provide
information on current business issues. They are holding an educational forum on the state of the
city on April 8th. Their community involvement ranges from organizing the Travis Regional

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Armed Forces Committee to putting on GOTCHA! They discussed what they do and what they
need with the council and the council just made sure they were keeping up with and maintaining
the building that they use. The last issue discussed at the meeting was the city attorney selection
process. The council discussed how they were going to select the new attorney and who would
be doing the interviews for it. The council took a while to just discuss whether they would do a
group interview or individually, and whether the whole council should be there. It seemed like a
big discussions for the council to not really come to a conclusion. After the council finished
discussing that matter the meeting was ended.
I think all of the decisions made at this city council meeting were made democratically. I
think this because democratically means, pertaining to or characterized by the principle of
political or social equality for all and the council was making decisions that would benefit the
community not just themselves or other city workers. There are many positives of these city
councils meetings, it allows people to bring their concerns to a council who can help solve any
problems or answer any questions members of this community may have. There are no negatives
to having a city council meeting because its not necessary to attend them and they typically
benefit majority of the community. If something is decided and it negatively affects someone
they should attend a meeting and bring it up to the council.
Citizens are given more than enough time to discuss the issues at hand and express their
opinions at the meetings. I learned about some of the things that are currently going on in
Vacaville and about the how the city council works in general. Nothing really surprised me at the
meeting, it was short and I had been to city council meetings in the past when I was in
elementary school. Overall the meeting was interesting and I learned a lot. City council meetings
allow citizens to express their concerns and opinions to the council in a formal manner. It allows

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everyone to have a chance to get their ideas out to the people who can help make them happen.
At the meetings that I have attended citizens are allowed more than enough time to express their
opinions, if anything it may be too much time.
I learned many different things about what is happening in the city of Vacaville.