Scappoose review finds attendance falling at annual town meeting; council weighs school partnerships, format and marketing changes

AJ Johnson, assistant to the city manager and city planner, told the Scappoose City Council at a work session April 21 that attendance at the city’s annual town meeting has declined since 2022 and invited the council to consider changes to format, timing and marketing.

“This year to my count, we had about 75 people show up,” Johnson said, summarizing attendance for the April 5 event and earlier years. He told the council the meeting drew about 225 people in 2022, roughly 50 in 2023 and about 25 in 2024.

The figures prompted a broad discussion about how to make the event more engaging and useful. Councilors and staff suggested partnering with the local school council, moving some programming to the high school auditorium while using a middle-school cafeteria for tabling, and centering the event on department updates and interactive exhibits rather than a single long address.

Staff proposed having department heads deliver short, templated presentations covering what their departments do, last year’s goals and accomplishments, and current-year goals — a change intended to give residents clearer information about budgets, projects and services. Council members suggested keeping presentation times short (several suggested seven minutes; others suggested 10–15) and collecting questions in advance to limit repetition.

Attendees and staff also discussed alternative dates and times. Ideas included a weeknight to avoid competing weekend activities, a fall date when people are more likely to be indoors, and scheduling that would avoid multi‑hour events so parents could reasonably attend.

Other proposals to increase turnout included inviting more public-service agencies (the fire district, the local PUD, the library and school district), providing child-focused activities run by high school students, interactive “bingo” style engagement to encourage conversations across tables, and modest incentives such as a raffle (staff mentioned “potentially with 1 free month of city utilities” as an example).

Johnson and other staff urged more and earlier outreach: two or three mailers in advance, targeted social media or YouTube ads, and use of the city’s email list (Johnson said the public-involvement list has “about 500 ish emails” now). Staff said they will send a newsletter with a QR code to gather feedback from residents who did not attend.

The council agreed the event need not be required by the town charter; when a member asked whether the annual meeting was mandated, Johnson replied, “Nope. Not at all.”

No formal vote was taken at the session. Councilors and staff generally endorsed further planning work: creating a short-term committee or holding one or two work sessions to develop a detailed format, refining goals for the event (education, community engagement or a community celebration), and asking staff to return with recommendations well before the next scheduled meeting.

Next steps identified at the work session included compiling lessons learned from this year’s event, testing a department-head presentation template, collecting resident feedback via the QR code and newsletter, and continuing conversations with the school district about a joint approach. Staff said they will bring more detailed recommendations and timing options back to the council in a future meeting.

Background: Johnson framed the town meeting as a regular annual event the city has held each year; he noted 2022 attendance was high in part because of major planning initiatives happening then, and that turnout has varied depending on the prominence of public-facing projects and competing community events.