To the Editor:

In a previous Enterprise letter, I promised to keep you updated on my proposal to give citizens a greater chance to be part of the dialogue involving county legislature issues.

My social media resolution would create an official hashtag (a label which would point you to the online discussion of the meeting) for each legislative meeting so anyone could add their two cents to an issue and also see what others were saying. I would also create free Wi-Fi in the legislative chamber so anyone could take part in discussion there regardless of income.

Many legislators are leery of new technology and have yet to fully embrace it. Though my resolution was defeated Monday, we did gain a majority of votes of the Republican conference and seven votes from Democrats.

This bipartisan support bodes well for the future and I believe if we pursue a steady drumbeat for transparency and dialogue, we will eventually succeed. In the meantime, county legislature meetings will be live streamed on the internet starting next month and digital files of those meetings, and all committee meetings, will be posted on the county legislature website (just Google “Albany County Legislature” to find them).

I have also created county legislature pages of my own on Facebook and Twitter in a grassroots effort to build citizen awareness and participation. Find them at facebook.com/grimmleg and twitter.com/grimmleg.

If citizens pay more attention to government and they participate more in the process, we will get better government.

Mark Grimm, District 29

Albany County Legislator

Guilderland