City Club of Central Oregon is good for Central Oregon.

And what’s better is that it has grown. The group’s 224-seat monthly forums at St. Charles Bend have sold out again and again.

So, starting in January, the forums will move to The Riverhouse Convention Center.

The club has been a valuable public forum for discussing issues before the community since 2007. Topics have included millennials, high school graduation rates, wildfires and Bend’s growth, clean energy and government transparency. Upcoming forums include Bend’s planned expansion and affordable housing. All of it has a local focus. The forums strive for passionate nonpartisanship.

If there’s speech or a message you don’t like, you get to speak, too. Questions are encouraged.

It’s a way to engage in some of the vital issues of the community, broaden understanding and meet others with a similar commitment to improving the community.

It’s not free. It’s not cheap, either. The member price for attending a forum at the new location will be $25, and the price for nonmembers will be $40. And individual membership costs $120 per year. It does come with lunch, which has had a good track record for quality.

But you can also get to see what happened for free if you don’t attend.

You can watch the recorded forums online. COTV and Zolo Media make the programs available to anyone on the City Club’s website, cityclubco.org.

City clubs have a rich history in the United States of being places where serious ideas are given serious discussion. These clubs have never been just meet and eat. The City Club of Cleveland, which began in 1912, claims it is the oldest one in the country that continues to operate.

City Club of Central Oregon is not flavored heavily by a single special interest. It is, though, host to three of the best interests — dialogue, free speech and engagement in the community.