You know how the same handful of ranting cranks monopolize government and community outreach meetings? Moving meetings online was supposed to broaden the base of citizen participation.
Didn’t happen. New research found that moving housing hearings online in Massachusetts ‘did not remedy systemic skews in participation.’
“Relative to all voters in the community, online participants in local hearings in Massachusetts during the pandemic were whiter (by a 13 percent margin), older (22 percent likelier to be over the age of 50) and more likely to be homeowners than renters (a 25 percent gap). These gaps are roughly the same as … co-authors observed with in-person housing meetings pre-pandemic. The only difference is that partisanship went up on Zoom….”
— “Thought Zoom Would Save Local Democracy? It Hasn’t.” Michael Hendrix, Governing
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Image (“Public Meeting on Zoom”) by Mike Licht. Download a copy here. Creative Commons license; credit Mike Licht, NotionsCapital.com
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