(Editor's note: The following article appear originally in Seattle City Council President Richard Conlin's newsletter "Making it Work.")

The Seattle City Council embraces the goal of open, transparent, and accessible government. All of our meetings are not just open, but broadcast live on both television and the Web. We post legislation on our Web site when it is introduced, and update it through the process.

The council has a model set of rules to ensure public access to public records. And we have a series of policies that encourage citizens to get information, get involved, and tell us what they would like to have happen.

We’ve even taken a strong stand in favor of open government at the state level, endorsing legislation that requires the taping of council executive sessions and allowing a judge to review it to ensure that the session was closed for a reason provided for in state law – most local governments (including the Association of Washington Cities) opposed this.

But we know we can do better. That’s why I have convened a "Special Committee on Open Government," which will review policies and procedures throughout the city to make sure that we are using best practices for public records disclosure and open meetings. Beyond that, we will consider how we can improve communication about potential council actions so that citizens can be fully engaged in decision making for their city.

Our first task has been to take the council’s open public records process, combine it with model rules developed by the state auditor and attorney general, and create an ordinance requiring every department to adopt best practices within a ‘culture of compliance’ for public records management.

These rules must include:

• Ensuring that there is a central point of contact in each department;
• Developing a system that informs a requesting party of the amount of time needed to respond to the request, a reasonable estimate of when responsive records would be available and the reasons why a requested record was not made available;
• Developing an Internet-based approach to both submitting and receiving records that can be accessed with a single click;
• Explaining how an appeal of a denial of a records request is submitted;
• Tracking all staff time and expenditures related to responses to records requests;
• Indicating all charges for providing copies of responsive documents or records (in print, electronic form or for large requests) and waiving or reducing charges for small requests;
• Publishing the hours and dates when public records are available for inspection and reproduction;
• Publishing all records retention policies;

Our second task is to review the rules for the council and city boards and commissions to ensure that all meetings are appropriately open and information about agendas, issues, and the opportunity for public comment are widely publicized, and to provide for orderly processes for considering decisions that ensure that citizens know when and how their input can be submitted and will be included.

We will also review comments and suggestions made by citizens and organizations concerned with open government, and look at the city’s procedures for public hearings on major projects to ensure that these are properly organized, publicized, and provide genuine opportunities to be involved before decisions are made.

Finally, we will take up the issue of how to make government, not just open, but participatory. There are lots of ways we interact with the public – e-mails, phone calls, letters, town meetings, public hearings, and visiting community organizations. But often these interactions are not systematic, and many Seattleites either don’t find out about them or don’t know when their input is most useful and when the train has left the station.

Sometimes people confuse endless meetings and perpetual process with real citizen engagement. That is actually the opposite of real engagement – it confuses and frustrates people, and often means that a decision (if one is ever reached…) is dominated by the ‘last ones standing.'

Citizen engagement can only become real if:

• There is a clear end point and decision to be made;
• Citizens can get full information about the issue and what alternatives are being considered;
• There are effective and well-defined ways to make public voices heard; and
• There is accountability on the part of decision makers – to listen to those public voices, and to explain what decision is actually made and how public input shaped that input – especially to those who may see themselves on the losing side of the issue.

We will consider new – and old – ideas to achieve those goals, and craft a council policy that will improve our processes. And we will launch some experiments in improving our interactions.

Council member Bruce Harrell has suggested an on-line Citizen Engagement Portal for informing and polling citizens on city legislative issues. That could be one way to improve communications and engage people who are not currently involved.

Other ideas we will consider include:

• Expanding notification and outreach for major policy initiatives, capital improvements, and budget actions;
• Finding ways to ensure that affected parties and underrepresented constituencies have equal access to legislative and budget processes;
• Working out how to balance the input of well organized/funded interests with those that are less aware of and engaged in the legislative process;
• Reviewing and evaluating current notification processes, public hearings, and other means of soliciting citizen input;
• Looking at other new avenues for input, such as facilitated processes developed by the Center for Wise Democracy and America Speaks, and the new approaches being developed by the Obama Administration at the federal level.

Open, transparent, and participatory government is a journey that must be continually reviewed and tested. We don’t expect to find a perfect process, and will probably stumble a couple of times as we work through difficult issues – balancing privacy concerns with open public records, balancing citizen input with the responsibility of elected officials to make difficult decisions.

We are committed to undertaking this journey, and to working with and for the people of Seattle to strengthen our democracy.