They manage our local parks, beaches and bins, but few people ever go to council meetings where decisions about their local communities are made.

While it has long been possible for the public to watch state and federal parliamentary sittings online, local council meetings have largely been restricted to those who turn up in person to watch and ask questions.

But a number of councils are now installing equipment to live stream proceedings.

With meetings held on weekday evenings, it is hard for many people to attend, even if they want to, City of Vincent Mayor Emma Cole told ABC Radio Perth.

"Six o'clock is a really tricky time for people, it's often dinner time or people are heading back from work," she said.

Get involved in the decision-making process

Vincent, in Perth's inner north, is the latest council to live stream its meetings.

Democracy in action: Greater Geraldton Council has been live streaming for several years. ( Supplied )

"This is really a way of trying to accommodate people and go beyond the seats in the public area," Ms Cole said.

"If you look at the minutes of council meetings they don't actually document the deliberations and the discussion between council members or really give you the flavour of the arguments.

"We really wanted to give people the opportunity to have greater access to our council meetings and also our council briefings, and we wanted to make it easy for people to engage in our council decision-making process."

Ms Cole said 120 unique viewers tuned in to the first broadcast of the council meeting on May 30.

"We weren't sure what to expect. We had heard from some councils [they were] having very low numbers," she said.

"But that was pretty good, we were pretty happy with that.

"We will be watching those numbers and whether it is something the community are interested in seeing and wanting us to improve on."

Transparency boosted

Voting in council elections is voluntary in Western Australia and traditionally interest is low.

In the most recent elections in October 2015, the overall statewide participation rate was just 27.5 per cent.

But Ms Cole said she believed interest in and expectations of local government were growing.

"I think that there is a growing expectation in the community around more transparency in decision making and more participation," she said.