I was invited for a short interview on the Ric Peterson Show on CJAD today. For those who missed it (which I imagine is about everyone), the audio is here: Me on the Ric Peterson Show (MP3)
Apparently Mr. Peterson finds this blog interesting and informative about local issues (joke’s on him, I’m just some moron on the Internet), so he asked me a few questions about the big city council meeting tonight and the city’s new ethics hotline. (My uneducated take in brief: it sounds cool, but experiences in other cities show such hotlines aren’t worth the cost.)
I started off the interview pointing out that even if people were interested, they couldn’t watch this meeting live. No electronic media – TV, radio or online – are broadcasting this meeting. Not even VOX, LCN, RDI, Info 690 or CJAD. There was plenty of live coverage of tonight’s preseason Canadiens game (two television networks and three radio stations, by my count), however. Gives you an idea about priorities.
Even the city’s own website doesn’t provide live streaming. The best you get are video clips posted online after the fact.
So if you want to watch the meeting, you have to be in the building. That’s kind of sad. Not that most people would sit down and watch a council meeting from start to finish (especially when there’s the season premiere of House), but you’d think we could find some space in the 500-channel universe to what news people pretend to be the biggest news story of the week.
The media is, of course, at the meeting and will report on it. The Gazette is quasi-live-blogging it. Radio and TV are providing updates as part of regular news reports.
But all of them are providing a filter on this news, instead of letting us see it for ourselves.
Maybe it’s because there’s a problem getting cameras in the council chambers?
The city has permanent cameras in the room, and there’s plenty of video to use for packaged TV reports. I don’t buy that.
I didn’t miss it! :)
Which three radio stations are covering the Habs game tonight? CJAD, CKAC, and…?
Corus’s CHMP 98.5 simulcasts the CKAC feed.
huh. that’s funny. i thought your last name was pronounced faGUY.
It’s really sad because CBMT-DT 20 (remap 6.1) is currently on the air. If the people running the local CBC station had any brains, they could have assigned the City Council video feed onto the 6.2 channel of CBMT-DT 20 signal. Ah! the Montreal media! Full of postering, and totally useless.
Remember Fagstein, mother is supposed to know about your exploits BEFORE THEY HAPPEN. Not after from reading your blog!
Sorry Mom.
The idea of televising City Cuncil meetings has been regularly discussed since the beginning of the Doré administration in 1986. (Drapeau would never have even allowed a discussion of such a thing.) Toronto has had Council meetings on cable TV since the early 80s at least.
There were always problems with cost (cameras, staff to run them – since the Rules don’t allow hand-held ones – and budgets were slim, etc. etc.
Mississaug and Toronto City council meetin are broadcast in RogersCable
It’s like watching paint dey
Borough council meetings might be more interesting to watch.