Garfield County streams video and audio, and offers on-demand access to county meetings

Law offers tax relief to senior citizen property owners

PRESS RELEASE
December 5, 2011

The Garfield County Board of County Commissioners is announcing the release of a new venue for presenting its meetings to the public through the Garfield County website. The new system provides streaming video of county commission meetings, as well as audio recordings, interactive agendas and will house meeting minutes approved by the board.

After the launch date, Monday, December 5, 2011, website visitors can now watch or listen to Garfield County meetings live and on-demand through a county website meeting page. Streaming meetings allows residents and business owners to have direct access to county government from the convenience of any remote location through the Internet. This establishes a new level of open government leadership through direct community access to live and archived meetings online.
Garfield County is providing video access to Garfield County Board of County Commission meetings, as well as audio access to Garfield County Planning Commission and Board of Adjustment meetings.

“We chose this avenue to deliver access to our meetings for the public around the clock and from any location that has Internet,” said Garfield County Commissioner Mike Samson. “We feel greater community access to our meetings will better serve our citizens, offer increased transparency and facilitate citizen involvement.”

Garfield County has deployed the Granicus Open Platform, providing citizens with a powerful new way to engage in public meetings and government events online. Now, online audiences can quickly follow the latest decisions and actions in county government through a comprehensive archive library of public meeting videos and government records that are all cross-linked and keyword searchable.

Viewers can also access relevant supporting materials like web-deliverable staff reports, which are displayed from agendas alongside the meeting videos or audio recordings. Additionally, viewers may jump to particular items of interest from the original meeting agendas, without spending time viewing other meeting sections. Website visitors who wish to watch or listen to the videos from mobile devices can use MP3 and MP4 downloadable formats.

“We like the archiving feature of this system, which will offer recordings available to the public during and after meetings,” said Garfield County Commissioner John Martin. “Over time we will build archives that will help our community be better educated on the topics of interest that come before this board.”

This new system is a cloud platform provider for government transparency, efficiency and citizen participation, offering the first product suites designed for government agencies to establish meaningful connections with citizens, while reducing operational costs.

“As a board, and in these tough times, reviewing and balancing budgetary costs, while serving the community’s need is paramount,” said Garfield County Commissioner Tom Jankovsky. “By using this meeting delivery system, we can provide a service to the community that is necessary and productive, utilizing a financially viable method of delivery throughout our nearly 3,000 square mile county.”

The Granicus system is an award-winning product of delivery for legislative bodies across the county. “When a community like Garfield County takes an initiative like this toward open government, it is matching government responsiveness to today’s technological demands: online, mobile, instant and convenient,” said Tom Spengler, Granicus CEO. “This county is taking the next step towards making government information conveniently accessible, as well as meaningful, to its constituents.”

Garfield County joins a group of other Colorado communities, including the Colorado Senate and House of Representatives, the cities of Denver, Grand Junction, Broomfield County and many others, in using Granicus to establish open government leadership.

View live streaming meetings or archived agendas and recordings here.

Streaming video and meeting archives