Amidst declining civic participation in local government, the feedback loop between civilians and politicians has much room for improvement.
The Laws and Rules Committee of the Ulster County Legislature on Thursday rejected a resolution that would have created a standardized approach to phone and voice mail communications between the public and their elected officials.
Currently, all legislators in Ulster make their phone numbers publicly available, but they are a mix of personal home numbers, personal cell phone numbers, office lines and call forwarding services. Email contacts are more standardized, with only one Ulster County legislator using a non-government email address.
The proposed system would have created a secure and standardized way to contact legislators by phone and leave voice mail, with supporters claiming no additional cost to taxpayers. It failed in a 3-3 vote.
Even supporters of the plan expressed skepticism that all legislators would use the service had it been approved. Critics questioned why a law was needed to standardize phone contacts when that goal could be achieved without it.
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