Ask the typical person what the function of a local planning commission is, and there is a good chance you’ll have them stumped.
After all, not everyone is well-versed in the structure of local government and the roles that each department plays.
In the case of three Hastings High School students, they’re not only going to gain a lesson in local government — they’re going to be participating in the process.
“I have an idea of what government is and how it runs, but I think this will give me a lot of fresh insight and a deeper understanding of how everything works and what the different boards do and why they do it and who to go to when you have an issue,” said Meredith, a sophomore at Hastings.
Meredith and two of her fellow Saxons — senior Brooklyn and sophomore Ava — were all sworn in earlier this month to positions on boards for the City of Hastings.
All three hold non-voting roles on those boards, Brooklyn serving on the library board, Meredith with the planning commission, and Ava with the Downtown Development Authority (DDA).
“Not many people know what the planning commission does,” Meredith said. “And I think it's something that affects us all daily because it’s the infrastructure and everything we interact with. I’d like to bring more awareness to what it does and why projects are getting done.”
To achieve these positions in local government, the three Saxons are participating in a program through the Michigan-based non-profit Government For Tomorrow.
This group works with cities and schools to create student board positions within local government. The arrangement is designed to be mutually beneficial as the students learn about local government by serving on the front lines and the municipality benefits from gaining insight from a demographic that often doesn’t engage with local government.
Government for Tomorrow was founded and is run by Liam Dreyer, a 19-year-old who was led to serve in local government at a young age. Dreyer was appointed to the Charlevoix DDA at the age of 14. He is now 19 and runs Government for Tomorrow.
The City of Hastings began to engage with Government For Tomorrow late in the school year last year when Brooklyn and Ava attended a meeting and applied Meredith caught wind of the opportunity later and applied.
Hastings history and geography teacher, Mrs. Putnam helped to spread the word and encouraged students to look into the opportunity.
The trio of Saxons also interviewed with Government For Tomorrow to ensure they were a good fit. The boards they were placed on were based on what aspects of local government they were most interested in.
Ava said that, while she might be the one at the table during discussions with the DDA, she hopes to be a voice for all of her classmates.
“I don’t want to be the only student that has a voice in local government,” she said. “One of my goals is to make sure I get insight from a whole bunch of students at Hastings. …I want to share what is going on in local government and share what (my classmates) want to see.”
While the three students do not get a vote, they will participate in the discussion and provide their feedback and insight. Just like all the other members of each board, they will receive the agenda and information packet in advance and are expected to review it and come to their respective meetings prepared for discussion.
“I’ve always enjoyed leadership a lot and also just learning about what’s going on in the community,” Brooklyn said. “I used to be one that would say like ‘Man, I wish this was different’ and now this gives me an outlet and something to be involved in.”
Brooklyn plans to focus her studies on ecology but said that experience in local government will not only help her in the leadership department but will allow her to more easily navigate the governmental side of that sector when she's older.
Meredith and Ava are both members of the Hastings chapter of Youth in Government and are very interested in going into a government-related job when they are older.
“Government is something I’m very passionate about and interested in,” Meredith said. “I’m not sure what level I’d like to pursue in the future, whether it’s state, local, federal or national. Whatever I decide to do, I think this position will help me get valuable experience and help me know what I’m getting into, and help me succeed in future roles.”
The arrangement with Government for Tomorrow isn’t one-sided, either. Hastings City Manager Sarah Moyer-Cale said that it can often be difficult to effectively engage with people of all ages and get them interested in local government and how their local tax dollars are spent. This is especially true for youth.
“It’s tough to engage with everyone, really,” Moyer-Cale said. “There are more and more means of communication and it’s just harder to communicate. …It’s, overall, a challenge but it’s definitely difficult to reach out to youth.”
“How do we do it? Am I supposed to be doing a TikTok dance about tax abatements?” She added, laughing.
Moyer-Cale, who was village manager in Paw Paw before coming to Hastings, was surprisingly never involved in government-related activities in high school — not student council and certainly not a program like Government For Tomorrow. She said she hopes the program will open youthful eyes to all the opportunities available within local government.
“I’m hopeful this program will expand people's knowledge of local government and their ability to participate in it and open up those venues," she said. "As a youth, I never knew that city manager was even a job. Kids don’t know what careers are available and that we do offer a wide variety of services — everything from fixing water mains to testing wastewater.”