After THREE City council meetings in the new Fishbowl and ZERO video records of said meetings, I finally just asked the City outright: “Are you aware of any plans to EVER have video recordings of council meetings? It was promised last year by [recently fired resigned Assistant City Manager] Gary Cox.”
The official response: At this present time, the City does not have any plans to video the Council meetings. If and when the decision is made to video the Council meetings, the videos will be made available on the City’s website.
You seriously can’t make up stuff like this. It’s almost as good as the LEDC promising “shovel-ready” sites in the Business Park four years ago and still having a useless weed patch today.
Just a quick reminder that not only did Gary Cox specifically promise video archives of the meetings, but thousands and thousands of dollars were spent on cameras and other devices to allow video recording of meetings and (later) live streaming.
Some expenses:
The City bought TWO Lumens VC-B30U PTZ cameras with RS232 controllers – those were $920 EACH = $1840
The City also bought a Matrox Monarch HD video streaming and recording appliance for $1,227 (NewEgg sells this same device for $995)
That alone is $3,000 worth of bells and whistles that the IT Department can’t figure out how to use. I have to assume that is the case: either simple incompetence or laziness. Why else would the City blow thousands on cameras and video streaming and recording and then NOT use it???
Of course, tens of thousands are wasted all the time in the IT Department and hundreds of thousands are wasted by the City in general. Three grand is spit in the ocean when it comes to City waste. But it just shows for the umpteenth time how wasteful and incompetent some parts of the City really are.
You would never catch Rickie Roy pissing away money like this in the Public Works Department. Never.