California has a chance to fix public meetings. Will agencies take it?

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OPINION – SB 707 is the most significant update to California’s Brown Act since 1953. Taking effect July 1, 2026, it guarantees the right to participate remotely in city council and county board meetings, a right that briefly flourished during the pandemic before being quietly rolled back.

For the staff who actually run these meetings, the reaction has been less celebratory. A legislative mandate doesn’t come with a budget line or extra headcount. And the typical experience of public comment (repetitive, adversarial, occasionally unhinged) doesn’t exactly make the case for inviting more of it.

They have a point. But SB 707 is happening. The only question is whether agencies treat it as a burden to endure or an opportunity to fix what’s already broken.

Anyone who’s sat through a six-hour city council meeting knows the issue isn’t too much participation. It’s the wrong kind. Attendance at most public meetings has been flat or declining for years. The people who do show up tend to treat the microphone as a stage. Three-minute monologues tangential to the agenda. Repeat speakers hitting every item.

Meanwhile, most residents with something useful to say can’t take a Tuesday evening off work, arrange childcare and wait through hours of procedural business. The result is a process that overrepresents squeaky wheels and underrepresents the working public most affected by the decisions being made.

SB 707 didn’t create this problem. But it gives agencies a reason to stop living with it.

This is what the American Civic League and a growing number of California agencies have been exploring: instead of bolting a call-in line onto a broken process, redesign how public input works.

If agencies are required to accept remote participation, they now have the infrastructure to let residents weigh in without standing at a podium. Online comment submission tied to specific agenda items. Voicemail lines for residents without internet access. Email channels that sort comments automatically.

When done well, meetings get shorter. Not because agencies are suppressing comment, but because residents have better options than a three-minute slot at 8pm. The performative filibustering that eats hours of staff time shrinks when the microphone isn’t the only way to be heard.

San Diego County rebuilt its public participation system before SB 707 required it. Board of Supervisors meetings routinely ran six to eight hours, managed with paper speaker slips, manual call logs and separate in-person and remote processes.

Now, residents sign up online before the meeting, select their agenda items and get called when it’s their turn instead of sitting on hold. Spanish interpretation is available at sign-up, essential in a county where 35% of residents identify as Latino.

The results: a 26% reduction in staff time spent on agenda preparation, minutes and post-meeting processing. And meetings didn’t get longer when the county opened remote participation. They got more manageable.

California has nearly 500 cities and 58 counties facing a July deadline. The agencies that treat SB 707 as a compliance checkbox will have the same six-hour meetings, increasingly overwhelmed staff, and the same narrow slice of the public showing up.

The question is whether California’s local agencies will settle for a broken process or use this moment to build something that actually works for staff and the residents these meetings are meant to serve.

Jay Dawkins, a transportation engineer turned civic tech entrepreneur, is the Founder of PublicInput, a public engagement platform used by local governments.