A sound idea

Quorum Court doesn’t need bells, whistles

In the grand scheme of the Washington County budget, $75,000 isn’t a lot of money compared to the $82 million the Quorum Court allocated to county operations for

2018.

So when the Quorum Court’s Finance and Budget Committee sits down for business today, kicking in that amount for a new audio-video system in the Quorum Court Room may seem like a drop in the fiscal bucket.

It’s a heck of a lot to most of us taxpayers, certainly, and there are other county needs that might benefit from such funding.

Justice of the Peace Lance Johnson led the charge on a new sound system, at the least. He’s acknowledged he’s at times had difficulties because he, like many people, is hearing impaired.

Meetings of the Quorum Court and other panels that meet in the Quorum Court chambers involve discussion, and lots of it. If a member of any panel can’t adequately hear the discussion, it can impact the ability to cast a vote. Imagine voting on a million-dollar decision when the sound system’s limitations kept you from hearing 10 or 20 percent of the conversation. It’s hard to vote with confidence.

One proposed sound system picked by county staffers would seriously improve the technical capabilities of the county to deliver sound to the hearing impaired. Vendor reps told the county people with Bluetooth-enabled hearing aids could use their smartphones to tap directly into the audio system’s sound. That’s pretty incredible. Indeed, anyone at the meeting could use a smartphone to access the sound and listen through headphones if they wanted.

That part of the proposal is needed. As Justice of the Peace Butch Pond recently noted, the county should not discriminate against those whose hearing is limited.

In our view, the Quorum Court —

which isn’t locked into any vendor at this point — should direct the county staff to look into a complete audio system that meets the need to serve hearing impaired officials and members of the public. That’s the minimum they should accomplish.

But a system recently proposed went well beyond that. It would change the way the Quorum Court’s voting process works. Rather than voice votes, in which every member casts a “yes,” “no” or “abstain” after his or her name is called, the new system would have them voting by pushing buttons on screens. Whether the individual votes or just a final tally of the numbers shows up during the meeting would be subject to county policy.

It should be a fundamental expectation of any system that every vote cast by each member of the Quorum Court or any other public body meeting there should be shown clearly to members of the audience and to those watching online.

Right now, the public sees and hears that through the roll call and it doesn’t cost an extra dime. There are, after all, only 15 members. This isn’t the U.S. House of Representatives, which has 435 members (or 100 if you’re thinking of the Arkansas version).

If the Quorum Court supports a change involving the voting, a new system should always make it clear who voted and how they voted. None of this final tally secrecy. Let’s the chips fall in full view of the public.

Whether the Quorum Court room gets fancy nameplates or individual monitors or iPads for each justice of the peace is just increasing the cost. It seems the county should stick with solving the basic problem, which was making the system work for the hearing impaired.

Any “upgrades” will only be progress if they ensure the public can see and hear every vote so that they can know how their elected officials are representing them.