Name: Sean McLaughlin
Age: 38
Education: Dartmouth College
Occupation: Producer, Open City TV; Inside Honolulu Hale
Hobbies: Hiking; web

"It was just Hap and me, and we used people in the Council print shop to run the cameras," McLaughlin said.

A decade later, the picture is much sharper for what McLaughlin kiddingly calls "Hawaii's longest-running, locally produced soap opera." Today, a group of about a dozen people work on Open City Television, which broadcasts regularly scheduled Council and committee meetings.

Sister show Inside Honolulu Hale, which enlists University of Hawaii journalism students to produce a half-hour capsule of Council actions, celebrates its third anniversary this year.

McLaughlin's private company, Ikaika Media, is under a yearly contract with the city to produce the programs. He also holds the title of director of telecommunications for the Council.

The annual contract is about $200,000. About $40,000 is paid by Olelo, the state's community television access company. The rest is from Council coffers.

Both McLaughlin and Council members stress that the content of both shows are completely free of influence from the Council.

It's written into McLaughlin's contract with the city that he makes editorial decisions along with those who work on Inside Honolulu Hale.

Council members "understand the independence of the program ... they appreciate the benefit to them and the public of operating that way."

City Council Chairman John DeSoto said he and his colleagues never butt in and that's fine with him.

"What I like about them is that there's no perception of 'something is wrong,'" DeSoto said. "They don't analyze, they just present what's before the public."

At Dartmouth, McLaughlin created his own major at a time when the school did not have a broadcast communications major.

McLaughlin worked briefly with a Hawaii television station before embarking on a number of non-commercial video ventures.