An internet outage brought the monthly City Council meeting to a standstill Monday night, just as Councilmembers were about to deliberate over some of the agenda’s hot-button issues.
Councilmember Sepi Shyne confirmed the technical issues that happened about two hours into the meeting, citing problems with an electrical breaker near West Hollywood Park as the probable cause.
While the Council was able to confirm David Wilson as WeHo’s next City Manager, the internet outage left them unable to address other big items on the agenda, including the loosening of live entertainment restrictions on Robertson Blvd.
Those items, along with the rest of the agenda, will almost certainly be moved to the Council’s next regularly scheduled meeting on June 21.
Tonight’s incident follows a similar cancelation of the meeting due to technical issues that happened last fall.
The City Council meetings along with those of its commissions and boards remain virtual.
Under pre-pandemic circumstances, the internet outage might not have impeded tonight’s meeting, but with general indoor assembly still restricted by the State of California, the City of West Hollywood is required to have an identified reliable broadcast for public viewing and participation (WeHo TV Channel 10).
In this instance, according to Councilmember John D’Amico, cancellation was inevitable.
“The City’s broadcast channel, which is the main source of communication with the public under the revised Brown Act, was down,” he said. “And Spectrum couldn’t reestablish a connection and didn’t know how long it would take to be back up.”
I was able to listen to the council meeting using the Zoom telephone call-in option and heard the entire meeting until the abrupt end.
Maybe it would be nice if the capacity of Zoom can be extended,so that more people can listen in.If there are no graphics to be shown,this can be a easier way to access the council meeting.
If they had eliminated their endless totally uninteresting grand-standing about their activities and co-sponsorship, etc, they would have had at least an hour live time before the breakdown.
What’s pathetic is if you watch any other city council meeting in the USA nothing can compare with this sad attempt at importance by five not very interesting people. Especially Horvath and Erickson.
Agreed. It took over an hour and a half for any business to get underway (8pm) The council needs to understand that although their attendance record at other meeting is important, it does not need to be said before items on the agenda. They also need to rethink presentations which take up an enormous amount of time.
If the council needs to keep anyone waiting for hours, it should be the recipients of these irrelevant awards, not the citizens who want to listen to and comment on agenda items and Pubic Hearings having to do with policy, legislation and initiatives.
One Word: REDUNDANCY.
Has the city council ever considered reconvening tomorrow after the outage is repaired. Sure, push city business to another month. Who runs a business this way let alone a city.? Another reason to move back to in person council meetings and reopening City Hall.
This group is pathetic. I’d like to initiate a recall of each one of them. Each one is an embarrassment to our city.
There are laws that require time and a process to notify the public for brown acted meetings. Perhaps educating yourself first before going negative is a better route.
You are very funny. When has this council ever followed protocols? Out On Robertson is one good example of the City bypassing formalities and “just doing it”.
There is a time and place for protocols; perhaps opening city hall would be a perfect start and opening live in person council meetings to correspond with the County wide lift of restrictions on June 15.
The council has been negligent for far to long.
I think you can adjourn till the next day in case of an emergency. So glad I switched from Spectrum