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Council meetings are now online: Sumner residents can now watch sessions on the Internet
Jul 08, 2009 (Puyallup Herald - McClatchy-Tribune Information Services via COMTEX) --
It was a stroke of luck that the first Sumner City Council meeting to be available online was one in which 150 people crammed into City Hall.
"What a (meeting) to pick," Sumner Communications Director Carmen Palmer said. "But it was perfect. The council discussed a big issue and I'm sure people (who didn't attend) wanted to watch it."
In May, Rainier Communications Commission, which provides the televised council meetings for Sumner residents, began offering online archiving to cities who use their television service. Sumner jumped at the chance, Palmer said.
"It's something that I think a lot of the cities were wanting to do and we're always looking for ways to make it more convenient for people," she said. "People can see meetings any time now, instead of just the times it comes on TV. It's just a really nice option for us right now."
Even better, she said, is that RCC offers the service for free because it is part of the RCC's new contract with service provider Online Video.
"The amount of storage space we (now) have is sufficient that we (can now) provide that service to all of our member jurisdictions," RCC Director Bill Oltman said. "It's part of the benefits our members get."
The meetings are not streamed live, Oltman said, but are archived and can we watched at any time. Each meeting will be available for a year after it's put online.
The commission offers this service free of charge to any of their members, which includes Fife, Orting and Puyallup. Some of the cities, he said, do their own archiving.
"(Puyallup) is going to be doing it on their own I believe, but it's available," he said.
City of Puyallup executive assistant Brenda Arline confirmed that the city is working with a private archiver.
"We are in the final planning stages," Arline said of putting meetings online.
Puyallup is working with Granicus, a private company. It will cost the city no more than $60,000 for the first year they use the service and about $26,400 every year after that.
The next step for Rainier Communications Commission, Oltman said, is to work with Comcast to provide On Demand video for the meetings, which can be watching on television at any time.
"It's not finalized yet, but we are hoping to provide that to customers," he said.
To view meetings, visit www.ci.sumner.wa.us.
Reach Reporter Avani Nadkarni at 253-841-2481 ext 314 or by e-mail at avani.nadkarni@puyallupherald.com.
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