The St. Paul school board will begin livestreaming audio of its committee meetings beginning in January.
The board members voted unanimously at their Tuesday night meeting to livestream the audio of the committee meetings, which are held in a smaller room at a table, unlike the formal school board meetings where members sit at a dais looking out at the audience, instead of one another. Those meetings are already video livestreamed.
“In that space we are having conversations that are rich,” board member Zuki Ellis said. “And you want to be able to share that with the community.”
She mentioned that the committee meetings held in a smaller room are also more intimate.
“It is the meat of where we are doing the work,” Ellis said, noting that board members sit around the table together and interact differently in that type of space.
The board had three options to consider. All three included an increase — beginning January — in the stipend paid to videographers from $500 per meeting to $1,000 per meeting.
The first option was to record the committee meetings but not livestream them. The second option, which the seven board members voted to approve, was to livestream the audio. The third option would have been to livestream the committee meetings from the room with the dais.
Members said they were reluctant to lose the intimacy of holding the committee meetings in their smaller conference room and therefore unanimously voted on the second option.
The audio streaming will begin in January, allowing time to purchase needed equipment and software, hire additional audiovisual staff and perform any troubleshooting.