Mt. Hope Students Film Last BCWA Meeting

I wanted to update you on the Mt. Hope High School taping project of the BCWA meetings. Recently, we made our last taping.

We started this project last March and it was fully funded by me personally. The cost was $40 per meeting plus tapes and discs. As the project became more fine-tuned and had been totally integrated into the BCWA website with links to the meeting tapes for ratepayers to use, we approached the BCWA for reimbursement of this project. It was definitely an asset to them for transparency and public relations. Many directors also told me that they enjoyed being able to go back and look at the tape regarding various votes and discussions.

After a stormy meeting in August, reimbursement was approved by a 5-4 vote.  At that time we were told that the BCWA would be looking for another source to tape their meetings but we should continue until they let us know they had found a replacement. That was three months ago.

I don't feel it is fair to Mr. Latessa, the teacher who unselfishly gave of his time to co-ordinate this project, pick up and return the camera lent by Full Channel, edit and compress the tapes, put them onto disk for delivery to Full Channel and Cox, and upload them to our proprietory site (again, for a stipend of $40 a meeting), to keep him dangling with no closure.  We met and decided that last night would be our last taping and advised the board of our decision at the Nov. 28 meeting.

We were happy to get this project started and help the BCWA with transparency on their meetings. Unfortunately, I could not afford to fund it myself in perpetuity.

If you feel that the taping of these meetings is something that you feel should continue I would ask that you contact the BCWA and make that fact known to them. It has been three months since they advised us that they wished to "relieve us of the burden" of the taping and would make their own arrangements. I personally feel it is imperative that they not only be taped, but be taped by an outside source to maintain the integrity of the content.

I would love to hear your thoughts on this.

Their next meeting is Dec. 12 at 5:15 p.m. It will be interesting to see if arrangements are made to have it taped. I will be out of the state that week, but hope that some concerned citizens will attend the meeting and let us know if it was recorded.