I’ve been the outsider you talk about but was fully informed on issues, served on a committee, went to board meetings, etc and still had a mass of local townies want to yell in my face and intimidate me for having a difference of opinion. Funny you mention looking your neighbor in the eye as one casts a vote… One of the proposals that was voted on was an issue that was never brought to the residents on the roads it impacted the most in the new proposal, yet so many, not unlike your comment cried how they were community minded people yet completely failing to see the irony of their efforts.