Prospect council approves first reading to fund new audio-visual system

The Prospect City Council on Jan. 21 approved on first reading an amended capital budget ordinance to purchase a new audio-visual system for the council chamber, a measure backers say is needed to fix longstanding problems with remote access and recording reliability.

Mayor Doug Farnsley said the current system has “substantial shortcomings,” especially for remote participants, and that the city has consulted since August 2023 with Paul Culbertson, a volunteer advisor who formerly ran audio-visual systems for the Kentucky Administrative Office of the Courts. “Anyone who’s attended council meetings in the past two years has witnessed firsthand the substantial shortcomings in the current system, especially regarding remote access,” Farnsley said.

The council’s first-reading vote on Ordinance 6-47, Series 2025, passed 6-0. The ordinance amends the capital investment fund budget to pay for a system proposed by Integrated Systems Support Group, a vendor that holds a state contract and therefore is not subject to a competitive bid for this procurement, according to city staff. The ordinance’s dollar amount and line-item budget detail were not stated at the meeting and are not specified in the public record presented at the Jan. 21 meeting.

Paul Culbertson, who advised the city pro bono, described technical elements of the proposed system during the council discussion. He said the design would hardwire most microphones (except a flexible mic at a separate table), add ceiling-mounted cameras with remote pan/tilt/zoom capability, use digital signal processors to prevent audio feedback and to mute microphones centrally, and support multiple computer platforms including Apple, Windows and Chromebooks. “You can mute all the mics until you’re ready to speak to the remote constituents,” Culbertson said, summarizing a feature intended to avoid “hot mic” incidents.

Culbertson and Mayor Farnsley told the council Integrated Systems has completed multiple site visits and was scheduled to return to the chamber to finalize details. Farnsley said the city has compared pricing and interviewed other vendors and that Integrated Systems’ state contract provides a favorable price; detailed cost comparisons were not presented at the meeting. He also said the council may hold a special meeting to authorize the work sooner if the vendor can begin before the council’s next regular meeting.

Council members and staff also discussed practical changes the new system would enable, including clearer video of individual speakers, an additional camera at the lectern, and audio configurations to avoid speaker-to-microphone feedback for remote participants. Culbertson noted the current system uses older components that can fail if powered on and off repeatedly, and that many of the chamber’s microphones now are wireless and directional; the proposed upgrade relies on category-6 cabling and centralized processing to improve reliability.

The ordinance passed its first reading; a second reading will be required for final adoption. The council did not state a projected installation start date in the public segment of the meeting, though members said the vendor had been scheduled to visit the chamber the following day to review installation details.

Votes and next steps: Ordinance 6-47 passed first reading 6-0; the council said it would schedule follow-up work with the vendor and may call a special meeting if installation can begin before the next regular council meeting.