Nearly a decade after installing broadcast equipment in their board room at an estimated cost of $165,000, the Kandiyohi County Board of Commissioners finally made the right decision Tuesday to start televising its meetings.
The commissioners are to be commended for their correct decision, despite continuing concerns by some commissioners as to the value of televising county meetings, the viewership of the government meetings on WRAC 8 and the cost of the public access.
Sometimes the commissioners make the right decision despite their own misplaced beliefs. This is one such time.
Starting in April, each meeting of the County Board will be recorded at the Health and Human Services building and broadcast on a tape-delayed basis later that night and at least four other times on WRAC 8. The board will decide at the end of the year whether to continue televising its meetings.
All four commissioners in attendance Tuesday -- Harlan Madsen was absent -- voted in favor of televising their meetings on a trial basis.
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Both Commissioners Richard Falk and Dennis Peterson questioned the public interest in the televised meetings during public comments. Additional concerns were expressed about how many people actually watch WRAC 8 government meeting coverage and whether the viewers were just seniors.
Falk also raised the question of whether televising the meetings was a wise use of the public dollar, claiming the city spends more than $170,000 to broadcast its meetings.
As it turns out, the cost concern is misplaced. The WRAC 8 budget for 2006 is about $150,000, according to city officials. However, this is the total budget for staff salaries and benefits, programming costs and equipment replacement for all programming of WRAC 8, not just televising city meetings. City officials estimate the actual cost of providing televised coverage of meetings at about $100 per meeting.
The county's others concerns are shortsighted.
* While the public may not be energized enough on this issue to contact commissioners directly, there is interest in televised county meetings. The city of Willmar has been doing it for 20 years and the Willmar School Board for almost as long. The public supports these efforts in open government.
* The public does watch the WRAC 8 government meeting coverage. While no viewership data are available, city and school administrators report consistent and frequent feedback from the public as a direct result of the televised meetings.
* Even if the viewership was comprised only of seniors, which it is not, we cannot understand why the commissioners would consider it unimportant to provide easy access to the senior population.
* Some rural residents don't see the value of the televised meetings because they do not have access to WRAC. Well, this decision is the first step providing county meeting coverage to nearly 10,000 homes in the county. In the future, additional avenues of distribution can be considered.
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The public access is a valuable service provided by the city, especially when no local commercial television access is available. We commend the city for its decision to provide this public access to the community for more than 20 years. We commend both the city and school for providing coverage of their meetings for years.
In the year 2006, the televising of government meetings for public access has become commonplace, from the city of Willmar to the state Capitol to Congress. It is all part of the continuing process called open government.
It is good to see Kandiyohi County join the 21st century. We commend the commissioners for their decision to televise meetings on a trial basis and encourage the commissioners to make this a permanent decision.
