The Board of Education’s public meetings could become regular staples of the prime-time programming on Montclair’s public access cable TV Channel 34.
Board of Education President John Carlton announced that he has named a special committee to look into ways the Montclair School District can improve and expand its communications effort, including possible live broadcasts of the board’s twice-monthly public meetings.
"The committee will look at a number of things, including the possibility of utilizing TV-34," Carlton told The Times. "We’ve also asked the committee to look at emails, Web site and other technologies."
Carlton said the committee would include three board members. He said Ron Riddick and Shelley Lombard have already agreed to serve on the committee. Shirley Grill has also expressed interest in being part of the effort.
"They will look at a number areas and make recommendations to the full board," Carlton said. "We hope to hear back from them very soon."
Carlton said board meetings, athletic events and other public school events could eventually be broadcast by TV-34. The committee will look into those and other possibilities.
Hoping for the Board of Education to televise its meetings, some Township Council members have urged the board to relocate its meetings from its second floor conference room in the District Central Offices at 22 Valley Street to the Municipal Building at 205 Claremont Avenue.
The Township Council Chambers are equipped for live cable telecasts, and TV-34’s control room is located adjacent to the chambers.
The suggestion was fostered by former Mayor Ed Remsen, who made an informal proposal to the Board of Education during a Board of School Estimate budget deliberations last winter.
Recently elected council members Cary Africk and Rich Murnick have repeated the offer since they were sworn in this past July.
TV-34 is Montclair’s municipal access channel. It broadcasts community-related programming and public service announcements for the township government, as well as for educational and nonprofit organizations.
Earlier this year, TV-34 launched live coverage of the Township Council’s Tuesday evening public meetings. To help make the broadcasts possible, the council installed new television lighting and a wall- and ceiling-mounted camera system in the chambers.
Carlton said Montclair schools are blessed with a diverse menu of communication modes. "Some of our parents get their information from their PTAs, or from their individual school newsletters or from attending meetings," he said.
"We’ve asked the committee to see how we can take advantage of the latest technologies to improve on that flow of communications," Carlton explained.
The board president said he wants its meetings to remain a public forum in which people and can attend and get information about activities in the district and are given an opportunity to speak.
Under Carlton’s stewardship as president, the board conducts public meetings every other week from the start of the school year in September through the end of June, taking off for the summer months.
In addition to formal public votes on new policies, contracts and the hiring of new staff members, the meetings include reports from Schools Superintendent Frank Alvarez and updates on school issues from the district’s administrative staff.
The meetings also often serve as the stage for presentation of awards to student scholars and athletes along with faculty members. The meetings are structured to include two periods of public input. Members of the public can speak on issues included on the agenda of the meeting or they can speak to any issues involving the district.
Parents regularly use the public comment sessions to voice concerns regarding issues in their particular schools.
Representatives of the Montclair Education Association, the union that represents its teachers and school employees, and members of the Montclair Fund for Educational Excellence and other local organizations which help raise funds for school programs also make regular appearances at the public sessions.
Carlton said he hoped that televising the board meetings live would not diminish public’s participation in the sessions.
