Bernardsville Council Audio Online

Bernardsville residents may not yet be able to see their elected officials in action, but as of last week, they are able to tune in to an audio of Borough Council meetings, starting with the March 11 session.

Earlier this year, Mayor Lee Honecker and council members raised the possibility of broadcasting council meetings as do some towns, including neighboring Bernards Township.

While officials haven't taken that leap yet, they decided to begin by posting an online audio of council meetings.

The audio is on the media gallery tab of the Bernardsville Borough website.

Bernardsville Borough Clerk Sandra Jones told the council at February's meeting that it would cost about $760 to enable the borough website to provide audio of future meetings.

She said the meeting's won't be streamed live on the website. The March 11 meeting took somewhat more of a week for the system's initial debut.

Given the media to be used, Honecker started the March 11 meeting cautioning officials and the public that they would need to be identified and proceed in an orderly fashion in order for those listening to the audion to be able to follow what was going on.

In February, the mayor likened the audio to a conference call.

The longer term goal is a live broadcast of the meetings, typically held twice a month on the second floor of borough hall, officials said in February.

Borough Administrator Ralph Maresca said then the cost of purchasing quality equipment would be about $25,0000. Honecker said the borough should look into arranging a live broadcast on cable television.

Councilman Joe Rossi also suggested the meetings could be videoed and then streamed on the borough's website.