The fate of the Sonoma-Marin Fairgrounds is up in the air, along with the future of beloved events and traditions, such as the World's Ugliest Dog Contest. To avoid a community-wide fight over the property's future, city leadership turned to direct democracy for help. Columnist Joe Mathews reports. Courtesy of AP Images. I went to Petaluma to learn what might become of the world's ugliest dogs. The Sonoma County city also showed me the future of California democracy. That future arrived with an unsexy name– the Petaluma Fairgrounds Advisory Panel, a version of a type of democratic body that is gaining popularity from Japan to Ireland.

https://www.zocalopublicsquare.org/2022/09/13/petaluma-fairgrounds-democracy/ideas/connecting-california/

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