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Monday, September 26, 2011

Board of Alderman Attendance Percentages



Have you ever wondered what percentage of meetings your Alderman attends? While exploring the City's Meeting Portal, I noticed that this information is available with just a few clicks. Selecting the upper right tab, Contact Us, leads to a page featuring list of the subcommittees and their members. Each members name is linked to a separate page that features the percentage of specific meetings they attended, including, Board meetings. Clicking on a Board of Alderman member's name will reveal their attendance percentages and, in some cases, how they vote and their submissions through the board.

Before casting judgement, take the following variables into consideration:
  • This is the percentage of meetings that they were noted as in attendance at the beginning, not that they remained at until the end.
  • How many meetings of that committee have been held. Meaning, if a member has 50% attendance rate, it could be a result of attending 1 out of 2 meetings that were held. On the other hand, committees such as the Finance Committee, need numerous meetings throughout the year for budget discussions and monetary appropriations requested by the mayor.
  • This is not an "end of the year" result.
  • Family issues, vacations, and membership on separate Boards and Commissions, such as the Traffic Commission could impact percentages.
For your convenience, I have linked their names to their respective pages below. Be sure to explore through their page, especially at the bottom where it says, "Vote History," to see what your alderman deems important and the issues that have been brought up around their ward.


At this point, the School Committee does not have information like this available on the City's Meeting Portal as their meetings, agendas, and minutes were added this past summer. If this information is available somewhere else, feel free to comment the link below.

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