Day 13 - Attend a City Council Meeting

Day 13 brought me into unfamiliar territory: my first Signal Hill City Council meeting. Not knowing how to attend in person, I took the safer first step of joining online—a choice that would prove both illuminating and unsettling in ways I hadn't anticipated.

Two hours later, I found myself staring at a stark reality about the apathy that has crept into both my life and my community around local government. The council was voting on significant water rate increases—15% each year for three years, followed by 10% in the fourth year—to fund infrastructure replacement that our city desperately needs.

Here's what shook me: only five households had formally opposed the increase.

Five. In an entire city.

As I learned more about the process, the revelation became even more profound. If 50% of households had protested this increase, the city council wouldn't have been able to implement it. Fifty percent. A simple majority could have stopped it entirely.

When I received that letter weeks ago explaining how to protest the water increase, I remember feeling powerless. I thought "protesting" meant I'd need to show up with compelling arguments, data, logical presentations about why this was wrong. But no—all it required was a letter. A simple, formal letter of protest.

The realization hit me like cold water: I could have potentially gone door to door in Signal Hill, educating neighbors about this process, helping them understand their power to influence this decision. Would I have done it? Honestly, probably not—that level of civic organizing feels beyond my current capacity. However, I would have posted on Social Media and I would’ve visited my neighbors to let them know. The fact that it was even possible, that such grassroots action could have made a tangible difference, left me questioning how complacent I've become.

When did I start thinking that my only civic responsibility was voting every few years? When did I begin to believe that local government decisions just happened to me, rather than understanding that I could be an active participant in shaping them?

Watching from my living room for two hours, I felt both grateful for the comfort and accessibility of online participation, and acutely aware of its limitations. To actually speak, to bring up points during public comment, to truly engage—I'd need to attend in person. I'd need to review agendas beforehand, prepare remarks, show up physically in that room where decisions get made.

There's something both humbling and energizing about discovering how little you know about systems that directly impact your daily life. These aren't abstract policy decisions happening in distant capitals—this is my water bill, my infrastructure, my community's future being decided by people I could meet, in meetings I could attend, through processes I could influence.

The nervous system challenge here wasn't just about trying something new; it was about confronting my own civic disengagement. It was about recognizing that my comfort with being uninformed and uninvolved is actually a form of privilege—and perhaps irresponsibility.

As the meeting ended, I found myself making mental notes: check the agenda for the next meeting, research how public comment works, understand the issues coming up for vote. The thought of attending in person, of potentially speaking during public comment, sends a familiar flutter of anxiety through my system. Which probably means it's exactly where my growth wants to happen.

Democracy, I'm learning, isn't a spectator sport. It requires participation, attention, the willingness to be uncomfortable in rooms where decisions get made. My nervous system challenge led me to a city council meeting, but what I discovered was an invitation to become a more engaged citizen—one meeting, one letter, one uncomfortable conversation at a time.

The infrastructure they're funding with these rate increases will last decades. The question is: what kind of community involvement will I build that might last just as long?