Aspinwall starting to post council meeting videos online

Aspinwall Council’s meeting videos are now being posted for public consumption.

The borough has provided a livestream Zoom feed for its workshop and voting sessions for a long time.

However, the footage was not available online after the meeting ended.

Council unanimously voted to change that and post at least the next five meetings on the borough’s website at aspinwallpa.com. It started with the June 12 session.

Councilman Mark Chimel made the motion to post meeting recordings.

He said increasing transparency is something he pushed for in his election campaign last year, and he believes this is a way residents will be able to see their government in action at their convenience.

“It was something that’s been important to me since I decided to run for council and something that seemed to resonate with people,” Chimel said. “Just looking for ways to get more people to feel like they know what’s going on in the borough.

“You can’t know how many people will take advantage of it until you try it. I’m hoping that we get people watching recordings and are getting engaged in what’s going on with council.”

Council President Jeff Harris sits at the middle of the table and is featured at the center of the video feed.

Aside from the camera adding 10 pounds, Harris said, posting meeting sessions is a good thing.

“I think it just makes sense and is a sign of the times in leveraging technology to provide access to our recorded meetings,” Harris said. “It is not a big lift to do this, as we currently have a Zoom option to view our live council meetings. We are simply archiving the recordings for a certain period of time, should someone want to review at their convenience.”

Borough administrative assistant Brian Corey-O’Connor, who manages the site, will upload the videos at no additional cost to the borough.

He said the site has about 15GB of space available and one gig stores about a half-hour of footage.

Details of how and where to store the data to make room for more videos after the five meetings are posted have not been determined.

“These videos take up huge amounts of data,” Corey-O’Connor said. “I think that’s what the problem is. I’m going to have to work on it. We might just have to buy more data and keep more on there.

“I think it’s a more modern way of keeping up with the (meeting) minutes and goings on with council for people that don’t have the time to show up every Wednesday.”

Sharpsburg posts its council meeting videos on its website. Recording links, agendas and minutes can be found under the council meetings section of the website’s “Government” tab.

The Fox Chapel Area School District posts its school board meetings on the district’s YouTube page.

Blawnox and O’Hara provide livestreams of their respective council meetings. Those videos are not posted.

Indiana Township supervisors in February voted down an attempt to livestream meetings.

However, a township resident provides a Facebook Live feed of meetings.

Supervisors who voted against the measure said residents who want to know what happens at meetings and voice their concerns need to show up in person.

In other website matters

Corey-O’Connor said he is in the process of switching Aspinwall’s online domain from .com to .gov in order to provide more internet security.

He credited Tim McLaughlin, the former council president, with advocating for the change.

Corey-O’Connor said he had to go through a lengthy process with the federal government to secure the domain name.

Only verified U.S. government organizations can register a .gov domain.

The site, aspinwall.gov, is still under construction. It’s expected to launch in the fall.