Mind the gap: Strategies from California on navigating access to public hearings

• Published date: 01 March 2023
• Author: Dominika Bukalova,Elizabeth Maland
• Date: 01 March 2023
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/puar.13581

VIEWPOINT

Mind the gap: Strategies from California on navigating

access to public hearings

Dominika Bukalova

1

| Elizabeth Maland

2

1

San Diego State University, San Diego,

California, USA

2

City of San Diego, San Diego, California, USA

Correspondence

Dominika Bukalova, San Diego State University,

5500 Campanile Dr., AH 4148, San Diego, CA

92182, USA.

Email: dbukalova@sdsu.edu

Abstract

Public hearings play a critical role in U.S. local government. The evolution of public

access to local government hearings and its related challenges have not been

documented in a systematic way to encourage research and collaborative scholar-

ship between practitioners and scholars. This article seeks to begin the dialogue

by offering seven strategies for navigating access to public hearings in local gov-

ernment. In recent years, local governments have faced increasing pressure to

keep pace with evolving technologies while balancing competing budget priori-

ties and assuming a growing role in addressing policy issues that were previously

the focus of state and national governments. The COVID-19 pandemic context has

presented further complexity. Left unaddressed, these challenges contribute to a

widening gap between what is administratively sustainable versus politically accept-

able. The strategies suggested address current challenges, attempt to bridge the

gap between what is administratively sustainable and politically acceptable, and

propose avenues for further study.

Evidence for Practice

•Challenges relating to managing access to public hearings could widen the gap

between what is administratively sustainable and politically acceptable.

•A variety of technological advancements and expanded accessibility options

have increased demands on local governments to provide an increasing array of

access options available to the public for public meeting participation.

•The challenges related to the COVID-19 pandemic have magnified both the

strengths and weaknesses of existing practices, highlighting that technology is

not always a panacea for facilitating effective public hearing management.

•This article presents seven strategies to help bridge the gap between what is

administratively sustainable and politically acceptable.

Disseminating information to the public, facilitating pub-

lic testimony, and, ultimately, providing a public, open,

and transparent forum to deliberate and vote on policy

issues are central tenets and responsibilities of U.S. local

government institutions. The focus of this article is on ele-

ments of public access related to publicly-noticed hear-

ings of the legislative body governed by California’s Ralph

M. Brown Act (Brown Act). Scholars have distinguished

between varieties of public meetings, highlighting that

public hearings are a distinct type of public meeting

(Adams, 2004; McComas, 2001). By providing an overview

of developments that have led to existing practices and

offering a snapshot of the COVID-19 context, we identify

key challenges facing government leaders and their insti-

tutions and provide strategies to consider for practi-

tioners and scholars.

Recent trends indicate that U.S. local governments are

taking on increasingly broader roles and responsibilities,

as an expanding array of policy issues such as immigra-

tion, the minimum wage, and climate change are being

tackled in the local government arena (Blair &

Starke, 2017). In an era characterized by growing

Received: 13 May 2022 Revised: 22 November 2022 Accepted: 30 November 2022

DOI: 10.1111/puar.13581

This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs License, which permits use and distribution in any medium,

provided the original work is properly cited, the use is non-commercial and no modifications or adaptations are made.

© 2022 The Authors. Public Administration Review published by Wiley Periodicals LLC on behalf of American Society for Public Administration.

Public Admin Rev. 2023;83:435–441. wileyonlinelibrary.com/journal/puar 435