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HomeMy WebLinkAboutminutes.council.20080616Special Meeting Aspen City Council June 16, 2008 Mayor Pro Tem DeVilbiss called the meeting to order at 5:00 p.m. with Councilmembers Skadron and Johnson present. TAPING OF WORK SESSIONS Mayor Pro Tem DeVilbiss asked Marilyn Marks to reconsider her letter of resignation from the Citizens Budget Task Force. Mayor Pro Tem DeVilbiss said he has spoken to staff and to Grassroots. The city, as a public entity, has access to Channel 11 equally with partners Town of Snowmass Village and Pitkin County. Each entity pays 1/3 of the costs of access to Channel 11. Mayor Pro Tem DeVilbiss said work sessions can be taped but the contract with the partners will need to be reworked if the city wants to broadcast because Aspen will be using more of the time. Mayor Pro Tem DeVilbiss said citizens can pay $300 for taping and broadcasting a show. Mayor Pro Tem DeVilbiss proposed the work sessions be taped. Mayor Pro Tem DeVilbiss noted Council meetings and work sessions will be streamed on the city's website by the end of summer. Councilman Skadron said his issues are that the city will soon be webcasting, the potential conflicts with other jurisdictions and Grassroots schedule. Councilman Skadron said he can support taping the work sessions and then have them shown when there is schedule availability. Councilman Johnson agreed; however, he does not feel taping work sessions necessarily increase public participation. Councilman Johnson said Council should be discussing ways in which the public can be encouraged to participate in city government. Councilman Johnson said taping and broadcasting meetings do not increase public participation. Councilman Johnson said broadcasting may keep people at home watching on television rather than coming to meetings and participating. Councilman Johnson said he would prefer to wait until Councilman Romero and Mayor Ireland aze present to discuss this issue. Councilman Johnson asked staff to research what other communities do to encourage public participation especially at work sessions. Steve Barwick, city manager, said the formal public hearings are probably the least productive method of receiving input. Barwick noted people often wait to speak until the very end of the public process. Barwick reminded Council staff has been experimenting with other methods for public input including large scale clicker sessions, like the core values and transportation meetings. Councilman Johnson asked for more refined costs on taping the work sessions and also what degree there is broadcast times. Brad Manosevitz, Grassroots Television, told Council CGTV is where local government meetings and other programs are shown. Manosevitz noted Council meets every Monday and every Tuesday throughout the year with only two Mondays being regular meetings. Manosevitz said for the remainder of 2008, there are 44 meetings outside regular Council meetings. The current agreement with the city includes the filming of 24 regular Council meetings and 24 special meetings, at Council discretion, as long as those meetings take place in Council Chambers using existing equipment. Manosevitz said there are 23 meetings remaining in Special Meeting Aspen City Council June 16, 2008 the contract, subtracted from 44 possible meetings, leaves 21 meetings not covered under the existing agreement. Manosevitz said the additiona121 meetings will be filmed at $150 each, totaling $3150. Manosevitz said Grassroots will work on a budget for all meetings to be presented during budget hearings. Councilman Johnson asked who will be filming the webcasts. Sally Spaulding, community relations, said there is a possibility to just allow one camera to run for a webcasts, especially for meetings that are low profile. Councilman Johnson said if work sessions are going to be taped, they should be broadcast live whenever possible so that people watching could come to Council and let their opinion be known. Manosevitz told Council the other partners in CGTV are fine with live broadcast of work sessions as long as that does not impact live broadcasts of their regular meetings. Manosevitz said the major conflict is the alternate Mondays with Snowmass Village's regular meetings. Manosevitz said there will be an impact to the available hours for the public to access their community access television station. Councilman Johnson suggested the higher profile discussions be scheduled on Tuesdays so these meetings can be broadcast live. Randy Ready, assistant city manager, said staff will do what they can to schedule with that in mind. Barwick reminded Council there has been an increased work load with work sessions. In the last decade, work sessions were discussions, no agenda, and no memoranda. This moved to requiring memoranda, forms of memoranda and follow up memoranda. Barwick said Council is approaching 8 meetings a month, which work load is not sustainable for staff. Barwick said he would like to work with Council to find a model for work session that are less staff work intensive, still have discussions and public participation. Barwick suggested Council could experiment with a fixed camera to see how that translates on TV and the web. Ready said his only concern is the 1/3 split in the agreements with Grassroots and the other political jurisdictions. Ready said webcasting work sessions and not broadcasting would retain that 1/3 split. Another suggestion would be less repetition of the broadcast meetings with more programming. Mayor Pro Tem DeVilbiss said his concern is that Council makes decisions in work sessions and calls them directions to staff. Councilman Johnson said there are a lot of initiatives that city staff and Council are responsible for and these cannot all be handled during regular Council meetings. Councilman Johnson agreed there is criticism that too much happens in work session and it may be partly due to work load. Mayor Pro Tem DeVilbiss suggested taping work sessions be added to the next regular Council meeting. Council agreed. Councilman Johnson said he regrets work being upset and angry and addressing the issue of taping; public debate is not helped in that emotional state. Councilman Johnson said there were issues beyond just taping work sessions that needed to be discussed. Councilman Johnson said Marilyn Marks was asking for access and it was discussed in language of transparency and good governance. Councilman Johnson said he understood the conflict to be that since the Council did not tape their work sessions, they were guilty of a lack of transparency, with which he takes issue. Councilman Johnson noted in the 2 Special Meetine Aspen City Council June 16, 2008 past year Council has appointed 3 task forces. Councilman Johnson said he would like Ms. Marks to reconsider her resignation from the budget task force as it is a separate issue. Councilman Johnson said at a work session last week, Council directed staff to enter into a contract for webcasting. The Council Chambers has been redesigned for better audio and visual results for citizens. Councilman Johnson said special meetings in the past have been taped. Councilman Johnson said he feels it is inappropriate for any one citizen to be driving the agenda for Council; everyone should be able to participate equally. Marilyn Marks said her communication to Council last week encouraged them to take up the subject of taping but did not expect it to be a topic of discussion at that meeting. Ms. Marks said Council has done many things to increase transparency and would like to see Council take the next step. Councilman Johnson moved to adjourn at 6 p.m.; seconded by Councilman Skadron. All in favor, motion carried. -~ Kathry . Koc ity Clerk "