Item 2A: Approval of City Council Minutes

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urban renewal and thought the detail provided had been useful. He determined from Ms. Medary that the webcasts as well as written minutes were archived. Mr. Poling commended the summaries prepared by Council Coordinator Beth Forrest, to which he frequently referred. However, he also referred to the minutes of other groups, particularly when the council was considering a recommendation from an advisory group. He liked having hard copy minutes and thought they were a valuable tool. Ms. Solomon was unsure of her position, and asked if the City could broadcast more meetings, such as Police Commission and Housing Policy Board meetings, over the Web. Ms. Medary indicated she would look into that. Ms. Solomon determined from Ms. Medary that the issue was raised in part due to resource concerns. Ms. Solomon thought it was important to consider transparency when talking about meeting minutes. She expressed concern about spending more in one area to save in another area. Mr. Pryor suggested that the minutes needed to be in a format that could be preserved, and paper was not the perfect format for that. He suggested that something on CD could be updated to a new technology. He agreed that access was another issue. He said he preferred a summary approach; if he wanted to know more, he could go back to the video recording. He believed that the actual broadcast would provide a better sense of legislative intent than written minutes. Ms. Taylor was also unsure of her position. She was not ready to say that minutes were not needed. She pointed out that not all citizens had access to computer technology. She was not ready to fire the minutes recorders yet. Mayor Piercy suggested that the issue did not concern the council only; she believed that the public had an interest in the subject as well. She did not want to make a determination without giving the community an opportunity to weigh in. Mr. Clark invited the input of minutes-recording staff. Mr. Zelenka suggested the minutes recorders would have a new job annotating the webcasts. He said his suggestion would only work for those meetings on webcasts, while other meetings would still have minutes recorders unless the City held more meetings in rooms that were wired for webcasting. That was also a resource issue. Ms. Ortiz concurred with the remarks of Mayor Piercy. She said that she sometimes had a difficult time understanding those offering public comment, and often relied on the minutes for that information. Mayor Piercy adjourned the work session at 7:25 p.m. Respectfully submitted, Jon Ruiz, City Manager (Recorded by Kimberly Young) MINUTES—City Council October 12, 2009 Page 6