tell us connected he i'm cassidy hermann for behind the real news your weekly update about what's happening at schenectady city hall your city your government your news this is the first broadcast of behind the rail our goal to keep you the citizens of schenectady informed about the business being conducted within these marble lined walls we'll be covering the city council legislative agenda a larry you know about public hearings changes in laws and ordinances that directly affect your lives as citizens of our fine city in addition to city council news we will keep you abreast of general city business make public service announcements remind you of important dates and deadlines and introduce you to some of the people working behind the scenes to make our city work we are here to provide you with the information you need to participate fully in your government before we bring in the news however we thought we would take you behind the rail and briefly introduce you to your city council and how it works george latterman behind the real civic correspondent introduces you to the schenectady city council i'm here at schenectady city hall where city council meetings are held every monday night but how exactly does a government meeting work the city council is the lawmaking and governing body of the city the council appoints a city clerk and certain commission and board members it also determines policy approved contracts and agreements set salaries and approves contracts for goods and services it adopts all edge sleigh ssion governing laws and procedures followed in the city there are seven council members elected at large to serve fo year terms except in the case of vacancies they serve on the city council and committees the presiding officer of the city council is this council president who is elected by the council members at the organizational meeting the committees of the council and members are appointed by the council president city council meetings are held on the first and third mondays of every month right here in the room behind me city council committees are responsible for over of the various functions of the city government it is at these meetings where much of the discussion about laws ordinances and resolutions are held and the majority of decision making is made meetings are open to the public as well as broadcast live public access television and streamed on the internet a complete video archive of all city council meetings is available on demand to be watched any time on your computer or mobile device although the public has a courage to attend  committee meetings they may not participate in the discussion that privilege is reserved for the city council meetings and on the second and fourth mondays of every month the council meets here in the city council chambers it is at the city council meetings where public hearings are held resolutions passed proclamations made and laws voted upon it is also here at this meeting where you the citizens of schenectady can be heard a privilege of the floor is afforded to the public to allow for you to communicate directly to the council there are generally two separate public speaking opportunities per meeting each citizen a lot of three minutes time to address a particular topic or topics during the first privilege of the floor the citizens are asked to confine their topics to current legislative business items on the agenda at this meeting the second privilege of the floor is designated for general city business and it is here where the public can bring up issues or concerns or even make public service announcements of interest to the community at large a third type of speaking opportunity is during a public hearing a special form of privilege of the floor where the council invites input from the citizens about a particular topic public hearings are required by law when significant changes in the city law are being made they are announced beforehand and are held on a specific date and topic when you come to a city council meeting and wish to speak you must sign up on a sheet located at the front of the room before the meeting starts there you  find meeting agendas and information package about the business before the council remember the government is its people and you control how it runs so come down to schenectady city hall and participate made up of seven members with the election of former council president gary mccarthy to the job of mayor of the city of schenectady a seat has been left vacant it is normally the job of the council to appoint a member of the community to the seat where they would serve until the next election after significant deliberation and some controversy it seems that the council has decided partially because of a tie vote to leave the position open and so perhaps november  weeks ago i came in other members of n y c seeing minority contractors spoke to you about the need to improve employment situation we are here again speaking out on the need for the city  schenectady to balance the playing field for all residents the city workforce excuse me is in great need for improvement we as a city need to set goals on the hiring of people of color for city jobs we are willing to work with city officials on figuring out a plan that would get the city closer to me responsible expectations a privilege of the  minority contractors participation in city projects was raised i spoke with miriam could just county and city affirmative action manager about the office and how women and minorities can ensure they have equal access to government contracts and yes contractors for all the bits that come out of the city of schenectady if they are i have an e mail list that they can request that i put them on and whenever there is a contract that goes out of the clerk office i alert the minority contractors about that and we also have a program here in schenectady county minority technical expert systems program they can contact my office and i can also put them in touch with that director who can really take them through the process of getting themselves certified which is one of the issues that if you want to participate in the contracts that the city put out annually you we will request that you become certified you do not have to be but certification help us identify companies that law that are owned by minority firms why is it so important for minorit women to get out there and get certified it's another way of identifying the business many times the state the county the city we have minority gold and this is the easiest way for us to identify those firms that or minority or women short of that sort of we would have to and we don't have the manpower to go out on site and verify that also announced a civil service exam opportunity c d s connect that he has an exam coming up it's the public safety dispatcher and the filing deadline is march twelfth and you want to who wants to sit for that exam has to filed by march twelfth minimum qualification to sit for the exam is a high school diploma or a ged so that means anyone who has a high school diploma or a general educational general education degree can actually come to six twenty stay state street and apply for this particular exam we are also going to have a review session for those people that want to high on the exam the re session is going to be at the community college on march fifteenth but the mosque the mosque put in their application if they want to come to do a review session and related nears the association of business women is holding life unplugged life is a wonderful program that women of schenectady business and professional women are putting together for the young adults in married children or no children and based on their monthly salary they're going to go from booth to booth making decisions this decision might be whether to buy a house or to rent a house whether to buy a car or whether  o take the public transportation and we have all those different food booth where they make decisions about buying food for a family of two three four or even one and we also  have those other decisions that you make as you go through life and we're going to have this in a compressed format where in five hours or less they're going to be making all these wonderful decisions that make every day of their lives the city of schenectady has always been a leader in open government and transparency and as one of the few local municipalities who broadcast their public meeting live on television and the internet and have been doing so for over twenty years the city has taken another step to improve the public's access to government business and information this week a new program set up for foil for oil freedom of information act legislation which requires by law that certain information be available for public access and inspection was originally enacted by president lyndon b johnson in one nine hundred sixty six and two thousand and four schenectady received three hundred seventy nine requests but that number has risen steadily where in two thousand and eleven the city legal department filed one thousand and twenty four individual request during the same period staff responsibilities for filing requests dropped from two employees and a clerk office down to one in the legal department a new software called husband made that eighty percent of the work and free staff time to do other city business the program will cost fifteen hundred dollars to set up and two fifty a month to maintain formal requests will be made directly to the city website and should improve response time and civic communication dramatically going hand in hand with open government is ethics a public hearing is being held on monday march twelfth seven p m and city hall council chambers concerning propose changes to chapter forty eight of the code of the city of schenectady as it relates to the city's code of ethics what kind of cars the police department is driving it and the news again a few council cycles ago there was a discussion on whether chevy tahoe is where the best vehicle for the job for police forensic gathering this week it was decided that the undercover officers would stop driving in cars that were seized by past drug bust the vehicles including a jack wire will be sold and the proceeds used to rent vehicles  is believed that having a constantly changing fleet of cars will help the undercover nature of investigations and save money over time it seems that the city property taxes are too high for the city to pay itself the council this week approved the title transfer of fifty two city owned property is to the non profits connect to the urban renewal agency effectively taking them off the tax roll and relieving the city's obligation to make the county and school districts whole for unpaid tax many of these don't forget to put out your garbage and recycle keep your eye out on this channel for schedules and important information this is cast herman for behind the r