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Orange County transportation officials are now live streaming their board meetings online, allowing residents to keep tabs on major developments like the Santa Ana streetcar project from home in the new year.
The decision to livestream the meetings comes after a Voice of OC investigation – in collaboration with Chapman University students – published in February gave the agency a failing grade for not broadcasting their meetings online and only posting audio.
[Read: Making it Easy to Watch Local Government From Home]
Two months later in April, the county’s transportation agency’s board of directors voted to start video streaming their meetings after months of reporting by the Voice of OC.
[Read: OC Transit Agency Moves Forward With Video Live Streaming]
“Transparency is key to all that we do at OCTA,” said the Transportation Agency’s CEO Darrell Johnson in a Monday news release.
“We know not everyone has the opportunity to attend our board meetings and with the Board’s decision to add video to the audio that has been available for years, it furthers our commitment to the communities we serve.”
Monday’s board meeting was the first one to be officially live streamed with video, allowing residents to watch in real time the decisions made by a government agency that oversees regional public bus services.
[Read: OCTA Proposes Cuts to Bus Routes as Ridership Hits Low Mark]
The launch comes after the board approved a contract with Network Television Time, Inc. to videostream the meetings. The contract will cost the agency over $270,000 in the first three years of video streaming.
Video cabling was added to the boardroom in 2015, but the agency did not upgrade their audio-only streaming, which had been in place since 2008.
Several board members pushed to further delay the decision until they chose an office for their headquarters relocation.
The agency closed escrow on their new headquarters – an existing office building in Santa Ana – in October, which the agency plans to move to in 2027.
While Orange County’s Transportation Authority joins a host of local public agencies video streaming their meetings – where decisions are made that impact the quality of lives for residents – others like Rancho Santa Margarita and La Palma are avoiding doing so.
[Read: Why Won’t Officials in Two OC Cities Video Livestream Their Public Meetings?]
The Transportation Agency’s next board meeting is scheduled for Jan. 13 at 9 a.m.
Hosam Elattar is a Voice of OC reporter and corps member with Report for America, a GroundTruth initiative. Contact him at helattar@voiceofoc.org or on Twitter @ElattarHosam.
Erika Taylor is a Voice of OC Tracy Wood Reporting Fellow and photojournalist. You can find her on Instagram @camerakeepsrolling or email at etaylor@voiceofoc.org
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