Will council video add understanding or more clutter?
While many a public body would prefer to conduct public business without that bothersome public in attendance, some do understand how representative government is supposed to work.
Elgin's effort to put streaming video of city council meetings on the Web by the first of next year is largely an effort of sound intent -- to help explain the council's decision-making rationale and provide more immediacy to a society that demands speed above all else. The city is answering an "I want it now" demand from a society that has come to believe everybody is a star, a moviemaker, a photographer and a critic, no matter the level of talent or knowledge.
Still, experience tells me that having meeting video won't stop a largely disinterested public from screaming, "How come no one told us about this?" when it stumbles up against a public policy it does not like and cannot ignore. Doesn't matter if dozens of stories have been written about it -- somebody somewhere will claim surprise and shock.
Those determined to be good citizens in the Thomas Jefferson mold -- educated, contemplative and active -- also will discover what every reporter learns -- an awful lot of official public debate and action is deadly dull and strangled in bureaucratic language.
The difference, of course, is that reporters get paid to sit through those sleep-inducing meetings and sift through the dreck while people like me get paid to seek out underlying causes, provide historic context and assess the quality of the decision.
For me, video of council meetings that can be searched by agenda item will be a nice research tool providing the basics of a decision. Yes. No. Maybe. And why. The official, public version of why, at any rate.
"Our goal is what every city's goal should be," said Elgin Public Information Officer Sue Olafson. "To hear, understand and respond to residents."
Though cameras in courts and other public arenas once prompted worries about showboating and grandstanding by public servants, that's a worry from another era.
"No one expressed any negative thought," said Olafson, of the council's response to the idea. Either you like being on stage these days, or you stay off it.
And in this age of mass information, some of it good and much of it useless, streaming video and a "respond" box constitute a municipal attempt to get the attention of residents already buried in junk mail, e-mail, phone calls and ads.
"In today's social media, you need direct contact," said Olafson. "How do you cut through the clutter and get your target's attention?"
Streaming video is one city answer to that question. Olafson said a recent city survey showed 87 percent of residents said they had Web access and 4 of 5 had a computer at home.
Beyond that, Olafson said, video access to meetings should help internal communication and help personalize council members, to make them more approachable by a public often intimidated.
"We hope it enables an opportunity to engage," said Olafson.
Only time will tell whether such engagement is ultimately deemed beneficial or just added clutter, making those in the video or those watching it pine for silence instead.