The debut of GFTV
Monday night marked the first time that the city of Grand Forks has used its new city-operated television station, GFTV channel 2, to broadcast a city council meeting. The city will no longer pay UND to air council broadcasts on UND's channel 3. Instead, the city now has its very own channel. Although it cost the city $25,000 to buy equipment for the new station, the move will pay for itself in a few years because the city will no longer have to pay UND the $8,000 a year that it had been for the broadcast time on channel 3.
The picture quality seems to be a little better than what we were getting on channel 3, but the sound was terribly low on Monday night. I hope that city staff is able to get that fixed before next week. I had to turn my volume up as far as it goes!
Unless your TV is able to magically pick up new stations, be sure to program channel 2 so it appears in your regular lineup. Watching the city council is a Monday night tradition for me. Exciting, huh?
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3 comments:
I'm not sure if it will happen, but it would be interesting to see the county commission, park board, and school board televise their meetings. I think it is great to televise meetings like this...it keeps governing bodies accountable and makes government more accessible for the average person. I know plenty of people who think the city council meetings are incredibly dull to watch...I'm used to getting "Oh no!"s when I put it on every Mondy night...but I think it is important to keep at least somewhat up-to-date with what is going on in the community.
Grand Forks County will never televise a meeteing because they don't do anything at their meetings except "rubber-stamp" whatever conclusions the "committee" came up with. Nothing is discussed or decided at their meetings. It is all done behind the scenes or at committee meetings held at some obscure unknown time so nobody can monitor them.
Interesting to hear what you think about the county commission, been_to_many. The city council is far from perfect, but I think it is pretty cool that they televise their meetings. There can't be as much "rubber stamping" going on when the meetings are right out there for people to see.
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