Regular council meetings are about to be made a bit more public, as the notion of streaming meetings, both audio and visual, was discussed by council-an idea that according to Mayor Bruce Decoux, he has been waiting for months.
At a regular Governance and Priorities meeting held on Tuesday, July 16th, Mayor Bruce Decoux made public the notion of steaming, or broadcasting council meetings on a website for the public eye to watch.
Decoux told administration he wants streaming to be put in place by the August 20th council meeting.
It was estimated that the cost for live streaming will be approximately $20,000.
In addition to the taping of regular council meetings, Mayor Decoux said that he hopes streaming will aid Council and Administration in times of emergency.
“We could be talking face to face to every person in the community about emergency issues so people know what we are doing,” said Decoux. “It could speed up the process of communication.”
Administration for the Municipality has already been in extended discussion with Box Clever, a digital media agency based out of Edmonton.
Marion Vanoni, Director of Finance and Corporate Services told Council that there can be a new computer to be installed into Council chambers on July 22nd, a tool she said was necessary for streaming.
Vanoni explained to council that there needs to be guidelines put into place for the live streaming including identifying which meetings to stream, the timing of when the streaming begins and ends, approval of copyright, the duplication and manipulation of the live recordings, what the protocol is in the case of a technical failure and the equipment that will be used.
All these guidelines will be determined under the procedural bylaw.
Councillor Andrew Saje expressed some concerns regarding when the decision was made to begin streaming as early as August 20th.
“There has been a lot of talk and fumbling over it,” said Mayor Decoux in response to Saje, adding that the official decision has to be made later at the regular council meeting, which was held that same day.
“Tonight is the night we have to bite the bullet and make the decision.”
However, the decision was deferred until the August 6th Council meeting because Council felt they needed more time to review the information associated with live streaming.
