LIHUE >> Community television coverage of Kauai County Council meetings has been delayed by as much as six days by what Mayor Maryanne Kusaka's office says is an Americans with Disabilities Act requirement. Kauai mayor’s insistence
on closed captions delays
Council TV broadcastsCouncil members don't like it,
but she cites a federal lawBy Anthony Sommer
tsommer@starbulletin.comThe administration says closed captioning for the hearing impaired must be provided before tapes of the meetings can be aired.
The mayor's critics say it isn't so and that she is misusing the law to delay broadcasts until the meetings are so dated they are no longer of interest.
Councilman Gary Hooser said at Thursday night's Council meeting the Council is being "picked on" because its meetings are the only ones the mayor's office has decreed must be closed-captioned.
Public meetings of other boards and commissions are shown without closed captioning.
The county pays Hoike, the public access cable channel on Kauai, $40,000 a year to broadcast tapes of the Council, Planning Commission and Police Commission meetings as well as a weekly talk show hosted by Kusaka.
At Thursday's meeting, activist Andy Parks accused the mayor of misapplying the provisions of the federal Americans with Disabilities Act to delay taped broadcasts of the Council meetings so long that they were "old news" by the time Kauai residents get to see them.
Until two months ago, the tapes of the Thursday meetings began playing the next day, with a close-captioned version ready a few days later. Two months ago, the County Attorney's Office ruled the tapes could not be shown until the closed-captioned version is complete. Instead of airing on Friday, the tapes did not appear on until the next week, sometimes as late as the day before the next meeting.
The mayor's office told the Council Thursday night it would be violating the Americans with Disabilities Act if it continued to air the Council tapes without first completing closed captioning.
Parks said the mayor's staff is misstating the law and that there is no requirement to delay broadcasts until closed captioning is complete.
"It does not exist, it is not true, it is a lie," Parks said.
Parks played a tape of a recent radio interview of Kusaka in which she gave her opinion of the televised Council meetings:
"All the garbage that goes on at the Council meetings -- it's such a waste of money paying for it," the mayor said.
Kusaka, who had been requested to attend by the Council, was absent because she was at a family funeral. Several of her top staff were present, but they made no effort to defend the mayor's statements.
The mayor's complaint was about Kauai residents who criticize her and the Council at the weekly Council meetings and the "disrespect" they show. Both state law and the Kauai County Charter allow citizens to speak on any topic on the Council agenda.
"We allow everybody, and they come to have free reign out there," Kusaka told a radio interviewer.
"I want children to have good role models," said Kusaka, a retired schoolteacher. "When we allow disrespect to happen, this a matter of decorum."
"Democracy is one thing, but having courtesy and respect is everyone's right," the mayor added.
County of Kauai
