City Returning to In-Person Public Meetings July 1, Meetings to be Streamed
After nearly 15 months of meeting virtually, the City of Jeffersonville today announced that public meetings will be in-person effective July 1, 2021.All boards and commissions, including the City Council, started meeting via Zoom when Governor Holcomb declared a public health emergency in March 2020 to address the COVID-19 pandemic. Since then the Governor has slowly relaxed restrictions including elimination of capacity limitations on the public gatherings.
“It’s been a very challenging year to ensure that employees and the public remained safe, but still informed of city business,” said Mayor Mike Moore. “We learned to conduct public business virtually. It was a great way for the public to stay involved. But as the vaccination rate continues to increase, it’s time for us to once again have in-person public meetings.”
Moore said he still encourages the public to comply with CDC guidelines when attending public meetings at City Hall, especially for those non-vaccinated attendees. The City will also continue to live stream meetings for the public to view through the City website at opens in a new windowwww.cityofjeff.net and the City’s YouTube Channel.
“One of the positive things that came out of the pandemic was using technology to make public meetings available online. We want to continue to offer that to the public going forward,” said Moore. “It’s a great way to make sure there’s transparency as decisions are made in city government.
“During the pandemic, all public meetings were streamed to the city’s Facebook page since that was only ability the city had to comply with state law. Since then the City has invested in improving the technology in City Hall to allow for streaming of meetings. Also, the City has launched a redesigned website that is more user friendly and capable for streaming live meetings.
“When the pandemic started, Facebook was our only platform that would stream meetings. We don’t want to limit viewing meetings to those who just have Facebook or a particular social media app,” said Moore. “Anyone can watch a meeting live on our website without having to access Facebook.”
The city website will include an user-friendly “Public Meetings” page so people can also watch previously recorded meetings, which will be categorized by the specific board or commission. The live stream will also be available on the city YouTube Channel for the public to subscribe to as meetings occur.
