Contract awarded enabling
board meetings to be aired
By vincent todaro
Staff Writer
EAST BRUNSWICK — If all goes according to plan, residents can begin watching Board of Education meetings on EBTV no later than February.
Superintendent of Schools Jamie P. Savedoff announced at the board’s Dec. 12 meeting that he anticipates having the meetings videotaped and shown on EBTV in February or possibly at the end of January.
At the same meeting, the board awarded a contract to Total Video Products Inc., of Mickelton, Gloucester County, to purchase equipment needed to record the meetings. The bid actually came in at about $8,000 less than the board anticipated. The contract is for $20,978 and includes the purchase of three video cameras for the remote video production. The cameras will each be made by Panasonic and cost $1,550.
The contract also includes a number of accessories, including ceiling mounts for the cameras, a three-way camera controller, power supply, video recorder, DVD player, monitor and editing desk. In addition, there is a $4,460 cost for installation, $900 for project management and $500 for engineering.
The expenditure also includes training for technicians.
The only board member to vote against the purchase was Susan Lamond, who said the financial burden was too much.
"I still believe $20,000 is too much to spend," she said.
She said she supports the idea of televising board meetings, however.
Savedoff said the original cost projection was around $28,000 to $29,000.
"The bids came in about $8,000 lower than the anticipated projection," he said.
He added that the district also has about $35,000 remaining from an interlocal agreement that it entered during the 2001-2002 school year.
"We have about $35,000 that we have not spent because we did do very well in the purchase of computer equipment (that cost less than expected)," he said.
Officials were pleased that, even after paying for the television contract, it will still have about $14,000 left from that interlocal agreement.
It should take about two weeks, or possibly longer, for the dealer to receive the equipment from the various manufacturers, including Panasonic and Middle Atlantic.
It will then take about one week to install the equipment, the superintendent said.
"We should definitely make the February date," Savedoff said. "We could start in January."
In addition to the money for the equipment and setup, the district will also need to pay about $130 per meeting for the technicians who run the operation, he said. That figure is based on televising a 3-hour meeting, though board meetings occasionally go longer than that.
The district will need a trained technician to run the operation, as well as an assistant tech, which is not a highly skilled position, he said.
The personnel cost — expected to amount to about $3,000 a year — cannot be funded with money from the interlocal agreement, Savedoff said.
"Certainly, we can figure out something with that cost," he said.
EBTV will help the district seek candidates for the technician job, he said.
When the board voted in the fall to televise meetings, some members of the public and board had said they favored televising the meetings live. District officials are looking into that possibility, but are waiting for Comcast to provide the necessary information and costs.
Savedoff said the last time he spoke with Comcast, the company told him it did not think it could tap into the existing cable fiber runs, and therefore would need to install its own.
The issue of transmitting the live feed from the board meeting room to EBTV and then to viewers has been complicated from the start. If the cable company needs to install its own fiber runs, live viewing may prove to be cost prohibitive.
Board member Patrick Sirr complained that Comcast is taking a long time getting the information, and he asked that they be asked to respond sooner.
Board meetings are expected to be repeated several times after their initial airing.
Both Savedoff and Lamond thanked EBTV for the help and guidance it has provided the district throughout the process.