One member of the Saint John Board of Police Commissioners says it is time they become more accessible to the public.
Coun. Gary Sullivan said he wants to see documents like police force budgets, policies and meeting agendas posted online.
Sullivan said they discussed publishing many of these documents in the past but the suggestion was made to wait until the city’s new website was up and running.
“The City of Saint John now has this beautiful, multi-functional website up and running and I think it’s time for us to take advantage of that,” Sullivan said during Tuesday’s police commission meeting.
The commission currently has one page dedicated to it on the city’s new website. It lists the names of the commissioners and has three documents: two agendas and one set of minutes from a previous meeting.
In addition to the documents, Sullivan said they could even look at posting recordings from open sessions of commission meetings.
Currently, all of the commission meetings are being recorded as they meet virtually through Microsoft Teams due to COVID-19. Sullivan thinks recorded meetings could continue even when they are back to meeting in person.
“It would require some more conversation with our tech folks … when we’re back in person to facilitate to make those happen,” he said. “It’s the way the rest of the city is doing business. I think it would really help.”
Sullivan would also like to see the commission section of the website reformatted so people can easily find what they are looking for.
Currently, users have to navigate through several menus on the city’s website to find information about the Saint John Board of Police Commissioners.
“I went to look up our own minutes and agendas and you had to search the last 90 days or something and then they would pop up,” he said.
“We don’t have a lot, but it would be really nice if we could get IT to format it so on the side when you go to our main page, you’ve got minutes and agendas, budget, policies and watch the open meetings.”
Commission chairperson Ed Keyes said he is hopeful more information can be added to the site once the city fully recovers from the cyberattack.
