For Village of North Hills officials, the purchase of audio visual equipment for Village Hall turned out to be a case of reverse sticker price.
Village of North Hills Deputy Mayor Dennis Sgambati reported at the village board meeting last week that a smart board and electronic sign for which the village budgeted $40,000 would only cost the village $11,931.77.
“Originally they [Adwar Video] wanted $13,370, and the training was going to cost $1,500,” Sgambati said. “We wanted the numbers refined a bit and village administrator Nancy Ritirato spoke with their ad rep and discussed a start up training presentation, and Adwar Video agreed to do it for no cost.”
Sgambati said the interactive white board can be utilized by the planning board, architectural review board and residents as well. The smart board, which will be on a mobile stand, will come with shelf access to put a laptop on. The laptop can then be hooked up to a mini PC that will connect to the smart board.
The electronic sign, which will be located in the corridor outside of the village courtroom, will show meeting dates for the court and the planning board as well as other village events, Sgambati said.
“It will be like a mini Web site outside our courtroom,” Sgambati said. “After we test this and if it works out, then we plan on buying a 66-inch smart board for the downstairs area. The real meat and potatoes of this project will be the first smart board.”
The smart board and electronic sign should be available in the next two to three weeks Sgambati said.
Village of North Hills Mayor Natiss expressed his pleasure with the purchase’s revised price tag.
“This is a substantial savings and I want to thank you all for your work on this,” Natiss said.
Natiss said after the meeting the village saw a need for audio visual equipment when they noticed other villages had such services, and wanted to make it easier for people to make presentations at Village Hall.
He said the village put $40,000 into their operating budget for the audio visual equipment after officials learned that Flower Hill had paid $30,000 for their setup.
It wasn’t until after doing some further research they found there were better deals out there, Natiss said.
“After we started looking at all of the different systems, we noticed there have been so much tech improvements over the year and audio-visual improvements,” Natiss said. “We found that if we went with a smart board system, we would eliminate a whole bunch of costs.”
In other developments Roberta Popper, a North Hills resident who ran unsuccessfully in last year’s election for trustee, asked the board if the village had any intention of recording board meetings for play on a public-access television.
“I’ve had several neighbors who have told me they can’t make it to the meetings because they are elderly or the weather is bad, and they want to know what’s going on,” Popper said after the meeting. “I think it’s important to the community, especially with a community that spends so much money. I think they will end up doing it after awhile.”
Natiss said the village has channels reserved on Verizon Fios, but said residents can get information on the village Web site and he wanted to see how well the new audio equipment works out before taking on another project.
“We’ve started looking into sharing some channel space with other villages, but we have a Web site right now and whether or not we do it we are going to have to see what happens,” Natiss said. “Right now we use our own system with an e-mail and phone-blast system. Frankly its premature to make any decisions right now, but I know there is a channel reserved. We’ve been looking into it but a lot of information needs to be reviewed first.”
