Supervisors Might Tape 3 Meetings for Television

Two county supervisors on Friday proposed a pilot program that for the first time would beam Board of Supervisors meetings to a television set near you.

Supervisors Thomas W. Wilson and Todd Spitzer want county officials to record their board meetings and offer videotapes to cable television companies for broadcast. If the pilot taping proves successful, the supervisors propose that the county study broadcasting all meetings live.

Community activists have long called for the board to televise its meetings as a way of giving the public a better understanding of the business before the county. For years, supervisors have been reluctant to welcome the cameras, and they rejected a similar proposal last year.

But the three supervisors who took office this year, Spitzer, Wilson and Charles V. Smith, have expressed interest in the idea.

“Our main emphasis . . . is to increase accessibility of county government to the citizens,” Wilson and Spitzer said in a memo to their colleagues.

The supervisors noted that many residents can’t attend the Tuesday morning meetings because they live far from the Santa Ana Civic Center or can’t miss work.

“We feel this must change,” they said in the memo. “There must be a means of communications that will allow our constituents the ability to monitor our progress without inconvenience.”

Most cities and many school districts in Orange County have been televising their meetings for years. Several large California counties also have begun telecasts in recent years, including Los Angeles, San Diego and San Francisco.

But obstacles remain. Although taping the meetings for the three-week pilot program would cost less than $1,000, there would be no guarantee that cable operators would broadcast them, especially because some face a shortage of available channels and an overabundance of community programming.

County officials estimate the cost of live broadcasts at $62,000 to $93,000 for a six-month period.

Because cities control cable franchise agreements, they often require operators not only to televise meetings but to pay for the needed equipment and staffing. County government handles cable contracts only in unincorporated areas.

The Board of Supervisors is scheduled to consider the proposal on July 22.

Last year, several board members expressed strong opposition to televised meetings, which they feared would create a circus-like environment where politicians and public speakers alike played to the cameras.

Supervisor Jim Silva has said he witnessed the drawbacks of televised meetings when he was a Huntington Beach councilman. He said the meetings often lasted past midnight as dozens of speakers lined up to have their few minutes in front of the camera.