During the July 21 Board of Supervisors meeting, it was announced that the county staff will be recommending condensing the board’s meeting minutes and providing a video backup rather than taking a full written record. I believe this proposal threatens public access and government transparency by making it much more difficult obtain crucial details, comments, and rationale on decisions. The proposal erects significant roadblocks to obtaining a full picture and tracking issues across the county’s meeting calendar (sometime for months or years); it also invites political manipulation.
Video or audio recordings are certainly the ultimate in accuracy, but they have significant drawbacks that impede public and media access and analysis. If access is sufficiently difficult, accuracy does not matter. Besides, if the Supervisors are so concerned about accuracy, why not have the video or audio transcribed, then it would be both accurate and accessible. Are they really concerned about accuracy or is it their frequent injudicious remarks that can end up on the courthouse steps or in an opponent’s campaign material?
Written records in electronic form (typically text, Word or pdf documents) are easily searchable and provide instant entry at any point whereas video or audio records usually require serial access – beginning to end or reverse – and a “play” option to get the audio signal. To use any fast forward or reverse function where the screen does not change you typically need subject indexing and that is a major undertaking that would use a lot more labor than it can possibly save.
How many people are willing to sit through four hours of a transmission looking for a single discussion? Not many, and you can bet the Supervisors know it. This process would also bog down media research that often starts in the collective memory – typically, didn’t Supervisor X say just the opposite three months ago, or was it four months? Video files can be huge, too big to download, then your work is at the mercy of the provider’s schedule or bandwidth.
Additionally, word searches can find remarks that are often out of place. The board regularly has discussions that “leak over” into other, sometimes thinly-related, subjects. It would not be unusual for a supervisor to say something like, “That’s what I meant when we were talking about Highway 25 this morning.” The video segment of the earlier Highway 25 discussion would not reveal the remark, but a word search pulls it right up along with the original comments.
Would that remark, or an indiscrete remark about how a deal was done, end up in a “condensed” version of the meeting minutes? I’d bet against it. Who would decide what goes in and what is left out? Do you believe the supervisors could control the urge to have embarrassing or revealing remarks deleted from the condensed version of the minutes stating they were not really relevant?
What about undetected technological failures; last week CMAP cut off the feed of the meeting just as the vote on the General Plan was about to take place. The final remarks may have gone to digital heaven forever if the Clerk of the Board was only taking rough or condensed notes.
This is just a bad idea. Any administrative benefit would be tiny; meanwhile, the hindrance to public and media access and transparency is huge. If you are as concerned as I am about all attempts to slam the door on the public’s right to know – which must include ease of access – contact your county supervisor and tell them you oppose any scheme that would condense the county’s meeting minutes.
Editor’s note: In an emailed response to Mr. Richman (and copied to the Board of Supervisors and local media), County Administrative Officer Ray Espinosa said the following: “As I mentioned during the July 21st Board meeting the Clerk of the Board will be discussing policy, agenda format, and contracts at a later date. Part of the policy discussion will be to what detail do we want the minutes. The reason why staff is recommending the condensing of the minutes to the pertinent or main points is primarily for minute integrity and accuracy. I’ve asked the Clerk of the Board to discuss this item at our BOS retreat in Aug. and to take it to the board for adoption at a later date.”