BANFF – The Town of Banff is a step closer to recording and live streaming council meetings.
In April, administration presented the governance and finance committee with a draft policy to get feedback on which meetings are to be video recorded, when recordings can be suspended and how long recordings are kept.
Under the proposed policy, only council meeting and governance and finance committee meetings would be recorded and live streamed, but not hearings of the Municipal Planning Commissionand Development Appeal Board at this time.
“In the world of Banff trials, I think starting with these meetings makes lots of sense,” said Mayor Karen Sorensen.
“Maybe a year or two down the road, or at service review, we could consider others, but I think we need to figure out how the technology works and get a little bit used to it first.”
Council earmarked $20,000 in the capital budget for live streaming, recording and publishing of council meetings.
The idea behind it was to increase transparency of decision-making and try to encourage more public involvement in issues affecting the community.
Under the proposed policy, video recording and live streaming would be suspended for all in-camera portions of a meeting.
Town of Banff administrators say recording could also be suspended in exceptional circumstances involving defamatory and offensive comments, or statements that constitute discriminatory or hate speech, or disclose personal information.
Kelly Gibson, the Town’s corporate services director, said that decision would be made by the chairperson, or it could also be made by a majority vote of council.
“I would think it would be a rare thing to pause, or interrupt, a recording of a council meeting to be honest, but it’s just meant to be more of a fail safe than anything,” he said.
The policy also proposes keeping the recordings for four years, a schedule similar to that of Edmonton and Calgary.
Gibson said many municipalities that don’t keep a record of the video use YouTube as a platform, which is the cheaper option.
“However, once posted, the municipality loses control of the record and if it is deleted, the Town would have no way to restore it,” he said.
Council meeting minutes will remain the official record of meetings.
“Public meetings will not be delayed, cancelled or postponed because of technical issues related to live streaming or video recording of meetings,” Gibson said.
