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Betras: Stream live video from election board
YOUNGSTOWN
With 24 video cameras monitoring and recording what happens at the Mahoning County Board of Elections, its vice chairman, David Betras, is suggesting the public be able to watch.
The county sheriff’s department monitors the cameras.
“We have nothing to hide,” said Betras, also the county Democratic Party chairman. “It’s not an issue to stream live as the cameras are already here. We should put it online. It’s a public agency. We’re not dealing with military secrets.”
The board installed four cameras at its former location at the South Side Annex on Market Street in 2004 and the sheriff’s department had 16 more installed in 2008 for what they have said is to protect and monitor the voting equipment and process. The board relocated last year to Oakhill Renaissance Place on Oak Hill Avenue.
The 16 cameras and eight new ones moved to the new board home.
Board Director Joyce Kale-Pesta said she would talk to the county prosecutor’s office and the person in charge of the board’s website, which is going through an upgrade, to see if streaming video from the office can be done.
Other board members said it would be fine to have video from the office online around election time.
“We have to have some level of respect at the board” for its employees, who would be watched while working, said board Chairman Mark Munroe, who is also chairman of the county Republican Party.
Also, Munroe said it might not be easy to stream 24 video cameras online at the same time.
“If it’s already being shot, what difference does it make where it’s shown?” Betras said. “It sounds strange, but people will watch it.”
The cameras don’t record sound, only video. Tapes are saved for 30 days, said Thomas McCabe, deputy director.
The discussion on the cameras occurred during Tuesday’s board meeting.
Also, board members said they would have Kale-Pesta and McCabe look at reducing the number of voting precincts after the November general election.
It doesn’t make sense to keep some precincts with very low turnout open , Kale-Pesta said. She singled out precincts in Youngstown’s 1st and 2nd wards and some in Struthers and Campbell. The board also could combine some precincts that share the same polling location, she said.
The county has 273 precincts, down from 416 in 2000.
Each closed precinct saves the county $700 to $1,000 per election, board officials said.
Munroe, who supports the reduction, said about 30 to 50 precincts could be cut to “balance the number of voters in each precinct.”
Betras said he would study the proposal when it was done, but as a general rule, he opposes cutting precincts.
“It’s about convenience,” he said. “A lot of people in urban precincts don’t have transportation.”
Also Tuesday, the board suspended clerk Gina LaMarca for three days, unpaid, because she refused to send a letter of apology to a Youngstown voters who called on the day of the November 2011 general election with a question. LaMarca was “rude” to the voter, who complained to election officials, Munroe said.