In Bridgeport Hall—

$92K OK’d

For A/V Studio

By John Voket

In back-to-back meetings the Board of Selectmen and the Legislative Council earlier this month approved a $92,059 change order that will provide financing to design, build, and equip a state-of-the-art television control room and listening system for the town’s council chambers at the new government complex in Bridgeport Hall.

The decision to dip further into a waning contingency fund resulted from a longstanding proposal to ensure as many public meetings as possible are accessible to the public. At the same time, the town is seeking to meet and exceed standards that guarantee hearing and sight impaired individuals, and those with other disabilities, have every opportunity to see and hear the goings-on at public meetings in their community.

The initiative has been a primary focus of a new Legislative Council subcommittee looking to enhance transparency and access to town government proceedings, as well as to better conform with guidelines set forth in the Americans With Disabilities Act (ADA).

According to a document provided by John Cross, a project manager for the Bridgeport Hall conversion who works with O&G Industries, the control room will be equipped with what consultants determined will be the necessary hardware and software to provide multiple camera coverage of meetings in the chambers, and the output capabilities to broadcast or transfer the audio/video information to multiple sources.

Up to now, discussions about airing meetings have centered on the local public access channel. The Bee is also planning to provide some rebroadcasting access to select meetings via the newspaper’s website and video links posted to its YouTube account.

According to the documentation, the $92,000 will provide the following components:

*A video switching station incorporating four camera inputs; a character or title generator to add text under video images or insertion plates or visuals being presented; ten hours of clip storage memory; and a camera control device with all related cabling and adapters.

*A rack-mounted video workstation with more than 400 gigabytes of combined storage memory; a DVD/CD rewritable drive; Ethernet ports; six-signal output ports; and all required mounting hardware and connections.

*A rack-mounted editing station with even more additional RAM memory and storage; a DVD-ROM media drive; and computer hardware with all necessary peripherals.

*A control panel unit with room for a secondary operator if necessary; and a “tally box” that provides up to eight output sources for various broadcast recipients to hook into either live or stored programs for rebroadcast.

*Two 22-inch widescreen monitors and one 32-inch LCD monitor

*One 3-in-1 MiniDV / High Definition / DVD-R video recorder player unit

*Four color NTSC video cameras — Sony EVI-D70 or equivalent

*An audio mixer — Mackie 1402-VLZ3 or equivalent

*A video switcher; control room monitor speakers; color test signal generator; and mounting rack

The system will also incorporate a hearing loop system, an overhead projector and dropdown screen to ensure off-site viewers and anyone attending can see and hear what is going on at all times during meetings.

The transfer also provides funds to complete the infrastructure installation including all necessary in-wall or underfloor wiring, outlets. and other components.