Money/Gathering: Town Budget Meeting

Our town is still small enough that the citizens are able to come to an annual budget meeting to present their questions, concerns and opinions to the Town Council. Town meetings are an honored tradition in New England. Unfortunately, unless there's a major crisis or conflict, few people take advantage of this opportunity. Tonight, the Council members almost outnumbered the audience of citizens. This is one of the members of the Board of Education, explaining why funding the schools is important.

Camera: iPhone 4s Processing: Skip Bleach, Plastic Bullet, SP PhotoTada

Center of Interest

All eyes (and a video camera) on on this citizen as he asks a question of the panel at a town informational session regarding funding for renovations to the high school.

Words

At the community team meeting for UpBeat--a leadership training/drug and alcohol prevention program at our high school--ideas are "brainstormed" by being written on big sheets of paper. They're considered and discussed, then we arrive at a consensus. Processing was done in SwankoLab.

Our town is still small enough that we have an annual budget meeting, where the citizens have the opportunity to ask questions and comment on proposed spending for the upcoming year. Here's a slice of small town life: the mayor seated at the table, the town manager and superintendent of schools chatting with townspeople, and a few folk reviewing the charts and tables before the meeting starts. Poster Edges made it into a sketch of local democracy.