Silver Lake Neighborhood Explorers

Check the Silver Lake Neighborhood Council Calendar for the Agenda.
The Outreach Committee is dedicated to involving more members of the community in the Silver Lake Neighborhood Council and keeping residents, stakeholders and the media informed about activities and news. Sign up to receive the Silver Lake Neighborhood Council newsletter and community alerts.

Email newsletter@silverlakenc.org to submit news or events for the next newsletter.

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Find your Neighborhood Council: enter your address in the search bar at: http://tiny.cc/FindMyNC
WHAT ARE NEIGHBORHOOD COUNCILS?
LA’s 99 Neighborhood Councils together form the grassroots level of the Los Angeles City government. The system was created to connect LA’s diverse communities to City Hall, and was established in 1999 by an amendment to the City Charter. While Neighborhood Council board members are volunteers, they are public officials elected to office by the members of their community.

The Neighborhood Council system tailors LA’s municipal government to the City’s communities, ensuring that recognition and accommodation of these communities’ diversity is built into City governance.
As a result, each Council is unique. Though every Neighborhood Council is held to the local, state, and federal standards that other City officials and agencies must observe, each Council has its own board structure, with seats representing the particular type of stakeholders which that Council serves. For example, some Councils have seats for renters, while some have seats for equestrians. Others have seats that represent internal districts. Boards range in size from 7 to 35 members. Most board members serve two-year terms; a few Councils have four-year terms, staggered so that half the board is elected every two years.
Neighborhood Councils advocate on issues like homelessness, housing, land use, emergency preparedness, public safety, parks, transportation, and sustainability. They also provide local expertise and a local voice on the delivery of City services to their communities.

Each Council holds monthly meetings of their full board, in addition to monthly Committee meetings with a more targeted focus on key issues or projects, like public safety, transportation, homelessness, or land use. All meetings are open to the public.

WHO CAN PARTICIPATE?
Another unique feature of LA’s Neighborhood Council system is its broad, inclusive definition of stakeholdership. Unlike other government officials, who are elected by residential stakeholders of the area they serve, Neighborhood Councils are open to participation by anyone who is part of the fabric of daily life in a community. This includes those who live, work, or own property or a business there.

Also included are “community interest stakeholders,” who have some type of ongoing, substantial involvement within a Council’s boundaries, such as students of a local school, or the congregation of a local church.
Board members – and candidates, and voters – need not be US citizens or legal US residents to qualify. Participation is also open to the formerly incarcerated.