WAILUKU - Maui County's budget shortfalls have led to another cutback - television coverage of county boards and commissions.
In past years, residents could watch certain meetings of the Maui Planning Commission, Board of Variances and Appeals and other high-profile county committees from the comfort of their living rooms. But Mayor Charmaine Tavares' office canceled the nearly $55,000 contract for meeting coverage last month, citing the county's dwindling revenues.
The contract had been awarded to an independent, Kihei-based video producer named Yourwebcast.com. The county upheld a protest by losing bidder Akaku: Maui Community Television before canceling the contract.
"We expect this to be a temporary situation until funding is available," county spokeswoman Lois Bisquera wrote in an e-mail. "This is just one of the many difficult decisions we have been faced with in light of our current deficits and an anticipated budget shortfall in the coming year."
Last month, the county announced it is currently facing an immediate deficit of $13.9 million, and finance officials anticipate revenues to decline by $50 million or more for 2011.
Jay April, executive director of Akaku, said he wouldn't second-guess the county's "budget realities," but felt it was unfortunate that meeting coverage had to be a casualty.
Television coverage helped make county meetings more accessible to citizens, he said.
"Boards and commissions coverage I think is important," he said. "I think people want it, and it's just disappointing that it appears there won't be coverage - for the rest of this fiscal year, anyway."
Coverage of Maui County Council meetings is not affected by the decision. The council has its own contract with Akaku and budgets around $190,000 per year for coverage of all regular council and council committee meetings.
Bisquera noted that the county has not had official coverage of boards and commission meetings for the past 15 months, although some independent producers have taken it upon themselves to videotape meetings for broadcast on Akaku from time to time.
She said that the meetings were still open to the public to attend in person.
Before it was canceled, the county's contract would have paid for video coverage of around 10 meetings per month and required that the video be made available online and broadcast on television. The contract would have run through the end of the fiscal year in June, with an option to extend for up to three years. It also would have required coverage of meetings on Lanai and Molokai.
The county has 38 volunteer boards and commissions overseen by the Mayor's Office.
The Mayor's Office issued an initial request for proposals for meeting coverage last fall, then suspended it, saying none of the bids met the contract criteria. The county issued a new RFP in November and awarded the contract to Yourwebcast.com.
Akaku filed a protest, and the county ultimately conceded that Yourwebcast.com did not meet all the requirements of the RFP.
Yourwebcast.com bid $54,750 to cover around 120 meetings per year, while Akaku bid $70,000 to cover 65 meetings. A third vendor, MAC Professional Video, bid $70,000 to cover 86 meetings.
Brian Rothstein of Your
webcast.com said his company provides video-on-demand services for clients like the Realtors Association of Maui.
"We do a lot of webcasting, which is what they were looking for," he said.
In his proposal, Rothstein also said he would post the videos on Akaku as an independent producer.
He was skeptical of the protest, saying he had been told Akaku "protests all the bids they do not get."
April said Akaku protested because it found "the county basically hadn't followed its own rules in making the award." The county ultimately agreed the winning bidder did not meet several requirements, including providing information about the company's experience and the experience of its staff.
"It seemed to me it was based only on price, not on quality," April said. "Of course, if you just put a camera on a stick, you can bring it in for a lot less money."
He said he also was concerned that the contract included a new provision allowing the Mayor's Office to tell videographers which meetings to tape, although the issue wasn't part of Akaku's protest. Under previous contracts, Akaku staffers were allowed to decide independently which meetings were most newsworthy and deserved coverage.
"It gets into the area of 'government television' as opposed to 'government-access television,' " April said. "That's a nuance a lot of people don't understand."
* Ilima Loomis can be reached at iloomis@mauinews.com.
*** Clarification/TV coverage. Maui Tomorrow Foundation provides funding for independent video coverage of Maui Planning Commission meetings. While an article published on page A1 on Sunday reported that the Mayor's Office has canceled a contract to televise county boards and commissions due to budget cuts, Maui Tomorrow's funding for coverage of the planning commission will continue, Executive Director Irene Bowie said.
