Local
San Francisco Mayor Holds Internet Town Hall Meeting
By Aiza Cayanan
Feb 28, 2010 - 5:11:00 PM

SAN FRANCISCO — The Office of the Mayor stated on Monday, February 22, that there was an “Internet Budget Town Hall,” about the current deficit that the city is facing. It had been held on Wednesday, February 24, from 5 to 7 p.m. The Mayor’s priority was to discuss the problems of the city publicly and the $522 million budget deficit for the 2010-2011 fiscal year.

He stated, “ San Francisco faces an unprecedented budget deficit next year and there are no easy solutions or choices. I want to hear directly from residents online about their priorities and suggestions as we grapple with the budget challenges ahead.”

The budget town hall was viewed at the following Web site, http://www.ustream.tv/channel/mayor-gavin-newsom-live where residents also asked any questions to the mayor live or gave their e-mails on BudgetTownHall@sfgov.org. Questions could also be submitted by Twitter with the hashtag #NewsomBudgetLive.

Veteran City Hall journalists, Barbara Taylor of KCBS and Rachel Gordon of the San Francisco Chronicle had moderated the event and selected all the questions for the mayor to answer online and in advance by the residents. The online event was to remain objective and it is the reason why the journalists had selected the questions themselves from all the ones that were received that day.

The Internet Budget Town Hall was part of a larger Open Gov Initiative for the City and County of San Francisco, focusing on open data, open participation and open source .