Thursday, September 9, 2010

Say Goodbye to Paper Packets

Today, the agenda for the September 14 board meeting was published, and a printed packet is being delivered to the house of each of the five board members. At the meeting next Tuesday, copies of the complete packet will be available for members of the public to pick up in order to follow along with the meeting business. All of this paper is both wasteful and expensive. The district spends over $300 per month copying board agendas.

Beginning in October, the Berryessa Union School district will go to an online agenda system, which will eliminate the need for all the copies. The complete agenda and all of the supporting documentation will be available online, where all members of the public will be able to review everything before the board meeting begins. The meeting agenda will be displayed on a big screen in the board room so everyone can follow along.

A more powerful feature is that all meeting agendas and minutes are fully searchable and are stored for 10 years on the server. It will be easy for members of the public to read about past discussions and find when certain actions were taken. Meeting meetings can be generated easily in the system, allowing them to be posted in a more timely manner after the meeting is done.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

This is wonderful news.

A little overdue, but still it's something we can all be happy about.