After building public pressure to start videotaping its meetings, the Minnehaha Creek Watershed District is slated to start doing so in early December.
On Thursday, the seven-member board of managers unanimously recommended a plan to videotape meetings and upload them to YouTube, with a link on the watershed district's website, minnehahacreek.org. The board is expected to formally approve the measure Nov. 20 and start taping Dec. 11.
Over the past few months, mayors from nine cities — Excelsior, Orono, Spring Park, Minnetrista, Deephaven, Independence, Shorewood, Victoria and Greenwood — have sent letters to the watershed's board, urging them to start broadcasting meetings, just as cities do, to be more transparent to residents, who are also taxed by the watershed.
District leaders have said that they didn't have the ability to videotape meetings until moving into new Minnetonka offices in summer 2013, and that only one watershed district in Minnesota videotapes its meetings.
District spokeswoman Telly Mamayek said the district will still need to spend $5,500 for additional storage and technology to be able to upload videos, as well as $200 per meeting on staff time for the work. There is typically one workshop and one regular board meeting a month that will be taped; committee meetings won't be taped. The board also asked staff to explore costs for more "robust" meeting videos, such as allowing people to search by topic.
KELLY SMITH
