Public Access: August 2008 Archives
Laconia Daily Sun August 28th, 2008
Letter to the Editor
This letter is in response to the topic of videotaping the Inter-Lakes School Board meetings, most recently addressed at the school board meeting of August 26 and the Laconia Daily Sun article dated August 27. A simple issue of videotaping the public sessions of school board meetings has turned complicated, now resulting in a proposed public vote on a warrant article in February. What has happened here? The reason the issue has dragged on for months is the board's ability to find fault with every suggestion that is put forth—be it cost, technology, audio quality, inconvenience, unknown viewership, or any number of reasons.
Technology is not the issue. Lack of Cable in
Video is no different than other media outlets (printed minutes, articles in local papers). Capturing a video of the meetings is easy. Ask any parent who brings their camera to a school play or band concert. Quality of the video is not the main concern. This is not Hollywood, The ability to capture information for later viewing is the important point. Cost of distribution via cable TV is being cited as a roadblock. Distribution of the video could be done in a variety of free or inexpensive ways. Free internet video services are available through YouTube. DVDs can be made inexpensively and given to each town office and town library.
The main issue is many parents simply cannot attend the meetings due to busy family schedules, or travel expenses from
I commend some of the board members for suggesting to do a mock video session at the Community Center. Unfortunately this was shot down without further discussion.
Video in general is not the issue — Meredith videos all selectmen meetings — a public forum that deserves public access is the issue. The school board should welcome video as another outreach to citizens who are highly interested in education and the school board topics, but simply cannot attend meetings. If selectmen meetings are made available to those that cannot attend, why shouldn't the school board meetings be made available?
Videotaping school board meetings is not a radical concept. The Town of
The Town of Pelham is exercising its rights under N.H. RSA Chapter 91-A. the NH "Right-to-Know" Law, under the topic: "'What rights do individuals and the media have?", which states, "Any person may record, film or videotape a public meeting so long as it is done in a manner that does not disrupt the meeting."
One reason for this letter stems from the school board meeting format in which the public input sessions are at fixed points in the meeting structure. It is impossible for the public to revisit a topic that is discussed after the public input sessions. After the Board unanimously voted to put the video question before the voters in a warrant article, there was no way for me to speak out because there were no more public input sessions on the schedule. The meeting format has been confusing to a number of residents, and perhaps deserves attention at a later date.
Lisa Merrill
Meredith
Editor, The Citizen August 20th, 2008
I just read the "draft" minutes of the August 14th 2008 Moultonboro selectmen's meeting. To my surprise I saw my name mentioned in the minutes (I was not in attendance) in essence accusing me of misrepresenting myself in my communications with Time Warner Cable. This was in reference to my attempts to find out the procedure to broadcast video of public Moultonboro meetings on TWC public access.
I have no way of knowing what TWC actually told Karel Crawford, but in my conversations and emails with two gentlemen at TWC over more than three months, I never once said I represented the town in any way shape or form nor was I asked if I represented the town. I find it hard to believe that the TWC representative would suggest that I did, but yet, there it is in the minutes for all to see.
All I did was ask how to get public meeting videos on a public access channel as a private citizen. If I had known the procedure or who actually controlled the public access channel, the process would have been different. TWC never told me how this works until after they were contacted by the town. So now the selectmen are offended by this perceived "discourtesy".
Believe me, there has been enough discourtesy from the selectmen (even at the last meeting) to more than make up for it. That's not what really bothers me about this though. What prompted this letter is the continued lack of leadership, fairness and foresight from some of our selectmen. What they seem to bring to the table though is a good measure of vindictiveness to those they perceive are against them. Think about it, a totally free service, at no expense to taxpayers that would allow greater access by the citizens of Moultonboro to the unedited workings of its government has been convoluted by the selectmen into a "discourtesy". Never mind that only a handful of people attend the meetings and the minutes would at best garner a D- in business school. Is it any wonder then that the selectmen themselves can't figure out what's going on or remember the decisions made? Oh yes, there is a long document being proposed and reviewed at a "work session" to discuss public access. No mention of when and where in the minutes by the way, but wait I'll look it up on the new town website ... but I can't as it is still not live! So in the meantime it will be business as usual and Moultonboro will remain behind the times. How disappointing. But let's look on the bright side. At the prior selectmen's meeting (which I did attend) a question I asked was in the minutes as a "member of the audience asked ..." No mention of my name. So to find my name in the minutes of a meeting I didn't attend (and it's even spelled correctly) is very encouraging. Keep up the good work!
Paul Punturieri
Moultonborough
Inter-Lakes officials are mulling over the costs and logistics of recording and airing school board meetings.
The board discussed different ideas for airing meetings with District Technology Director Allan Hale during Tuesday's meeting. The taping of meetings has been an ongoing issue as some residents have requested meetings be aired.
The district has spoken with Lakes Region Public Access and the Laconia School District as part of a preliminary look at the logistics of recording meetings as well as contacting various media companies about airing meetings online.Hale said the district would have to contract with a media server company in order to stream video online. The district server does not have enough bandwidth to support streaming video and multiple viewings could paralyze the website....
“I think the best phrase in this situation would be ‘stay tuned,” said (Hollis) Austin
The Meredith News July 31st, 2008
Sara Schmidt
MOULTONBORO —
Those turning to Channel 3 to catch last week’s selectman’s meeting will have to wait just a bit longer, as protocol for taping and airing the public meetings is being hammered out. After months of work, the
Moultonboro Citizens’ Alliance managed to get approval from Time-Warner to broadcast recordings of the Thursday night meetings of the Moultonboro Board of Selectmen on their public access channel. But those who tuned in on the projected launch date of July 15 at 7 p.m. only saw static. The Moultonboro Board of Selectmen requested that the channel not air any tapes until the town could determine its policy on broadcasting tapes of public meetings, according to Government Relations Manager Mike Edgecomb. Currently, no such policy exists in Moultonboro. “The selectmen asked us to hold off until they review (procedure),” said Edgecomb. “It’s in the selectmen’s hands.....
