Kingston staff reorganize online records, YouTube playlists and pursue archival grant

City staff told the Kingston Common Council’s Laws and Rules Committee on March 19 that they have organized the City of Kingston YouTube channel into playlists by committee and are pursuing a larger program to digitize and better index city records.

Committee members said the changes are intended to make meetings, resolutions and other records easier for residents and city staff to find. Staff described three near-term steps: standardize video titles and playlists on YouTube, begin updating Ecode monthly instead of quarterly, and inventory paper records so the city can apply for a state archival grant.

The staff presentation said playlists will group videos by committee and list meetings by date so viewers can find past meetings more quickly. Staff said standard naming conventions for uploaded videos — the committee heard these were being coordinated by staff identified as Summer and Kyle — will make the uploads easier to search. Committee members also discussed producing a short “how-to” video and other guidance for residents on finding meetings and making public comment.

City staff reported that many PDFs of resolutions on the website are OCR-searchable, but that users still must locate the correct PDF file before searching. To improve that, staff said they will start naming scanned resolutions with descriptive titles (up to about 200 characters), so a web search for topics such as the city newspaper or a policy will return the matching resolution file.

Staff asked for help with a larger archival inventory. To apply for the state grant they plan to seek, the city needs an estimate of the volume of paper records (page counts) to provide cost estimates in the grant application. Committee members suggested an intern could be tasked with counting files and pages; staff said one possible funding path is the council’s consultant line or other council funds if council members approve.

Committee members also heard that Ecode updates — the searchable municipal code service — will move from quarterly to monthly posting for local law updates at no additional cost, which staff said should speed public access to the text of newly adopted local laws. Staff noted that new automatic captions/transcripts on YouTube are not perfect but can help residents skim meetings.

City staff said two grants were referenced in the discussion: a U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA)-linked grant that helps fund urban forestry work and a New York State Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) grant for planting/pruning work; the DEC award was cited as about $740,000 and staff said the city is waiting on the signed contract, which may be delayed until after the state’s fiscal-year close.

The committee did not vote on these items; members asked staff to pursue outreach and return with a public education plan and timing for the archive inventory and the naming convention rollout.

Ending: Staff said they will begin more descriptive naming of resolutions at the next council meeting, continue to add playlists on YouTube, and prepare an inventory plan for the grant application and to support a future searchable resolution database.