Please attend or watch Telecom Board tonight. It may not be live at 5:30 but is to be run immediately afterward and may be found live on the city site

Watch Telecom Board live or archived later at this link

Although the local media harshly criticized the City's recent denial of a Council Member’s scheduled issue forum on the government channel, you probably haven’t heard about a Telecom Board member’s proposal to totally eliminate such forums. The Board will hear the proposal today at their “live” meeting at City Hall (5:30 p.m.)..

Board Member Bell will present the proposal as a slide show, after consulting privately with the City Attorney Kit Williams and Susan Thomas, Policy and Information Officer. Kit has said that the forums are legal and constitutional, and both he and Ms. Thomas have said they thing the forums are great, so it’s hard to figure their decision to nix the forums and completely bypass the Telecommunications Board in the process of denying the earlier forum request..

As I see it, the City Hall folks have presented only opinions and conjecture as their reasons for denying the forums, and I have filed a complaint to the Board that also should be considered at tonight’s Board meeting. In addition, several local citizens have followed current channel policy to request an issue forum to discuss Board Member Bell’s proposal, as well as to provide more public iinput into how the government channel is used and programmed.

Please tune in to the Board Meeting tonight on Channel 16. You can also call in or send an email during the meeting.
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