Responses from my city to my email (kind of repeated in this post below). They seem pretty open to the idea, but of course tech questions abound.

Even if they don’t do it as the normal way of doing things, it would be great to supplement the paid movie postings with additional free ones.

Mayor Mark Foutch:

Emmett, those look like great suggestions to me and we’ll ask our staff look into them. As a 65-year-old perpetually three technology generations behind current apps, I’m continually amazed at the explosion of new options out there. I’m glad we have both a great professional City staff AND a citizenry expert in subjects from Art to Zoology, and willing to share their expertise with us.

Thanks a lot.

Mark Foutch
Mayor

Cathie Butler, the city’s communications manager:

Hi, Emmett – wanted to let you know I’ve passed your email along to
Shawn Ward who is the City’s IT Manager. This is way beyond my
knowledge of systems. FYI, the Granicus is more then video streaming;
it’s also the system we use to produce Council meeting minutes and post
both the minutes and Council agenda documents so they are connected with
the streaming video. Cathie

Councilmember Joe Hyer:

Emmett –

I think the tech folks got forwarded your email to respond … but I do know a couple of things that explain it better – it wasn’t just video streaming we got with grannicus, it also does the minutes in an easier way, which has cost us thousands in overtime for staff to do in the past … and links the minutes with the video.
We also have to have guaranteed level of service for citizens, and the free services can’t offer access and reliability…guaranteed.

But I think the real kicker is the time savings in MINUTES preparation — the added bonus was the ability to video stream…

See ya soon,

Joe