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12 By Dane Anderson, Staff Writer
The Eanes school board approved the purchase of high definition broadcast video equipment last week that cost more than $600,000.
Superintendent Nola Wellman recommended the purchase, noting the equipment will be used at the recently renovated Westlake High School Performing Arts Center and at Chapparal Stadium. The total price of $662,037 also includes the construction of a new video control center at the PAC, where the majority of the video work will take place.
David Poole, Eanes PAC director, said the new equipment will soon allow the district to utilize Blue Ray technology, expand its big screen Image Magnification (or IMAG) capability in the PAC and eventually incorporate surround sound.
“New studio cameras will give the district the ability to do live-to-tape recording,” Poole said. “All the video editing will be done in real time in the control room, and we will walk away with a tape the night of games or performances. Everything will be done in real time and broadcast live.”
The district will purchase the equipment from Omega Broadcast Group. The new high-definition equipment replaces the aging analog equipment and will help support the district’s performing arts, athletics and growing tech theater program.
Critics questioned the purchase, saying that now is not the best time to invest more than half a million dollars in video technology.
“It is irresponsible spending, and it was not approved by the bond committee,” pointed out Patrick Fries, a parent of an elementary school student in Eanes, the owner of a film production company and an advocate for Americans with Disabilities Act modifications in the district. “I don’t know how the board of trustees can justify spending this kind of money on a broadcast center that even the University of Texas doesn’t have, when we cannot afford to build safety fences around our campuses nor build sidewalks for kids with disabilities.”
Poole said the district HD video technology package provided by Omega will include four high definition studio cameras, two robotics cameras to be mounted in the PAC, three new video projectors to be used inside the PAC theater, three new HD instant replay stations, the expanded IMAG technology and a backbone of fiber cable.
Poole said the district has been using video technology since the purchase of the Daktronics ProStar system, often referred to as the Jumbotron, for Chaparral Stadium in 2002.
“Basically, we’ve been into video production for seven years,” Poole said. “When the district purchased the Jumbotron, [board members and administrators] realized that they would need professional quality broadcast video equipment and that technology would need to be updated over time.”
Wellman told the board that the time had indeed come to update the equipment. The analog equipment had outlived its usefulness.
“All that technology is gone now,” Poole agreed. “Nobody is buying analog cable any more.”
Monday, for the first time in months, the district took control of the PAC from contractors during the final phases of a $9.3 million renovation project.
“Every aspect of the PAC has been upgraded, lighting, air conditioning, sound, seating, ADA access and everything else,” Poole said. “We had to ask ourselves if we were going to pull old technology into the facility or if we were going to upgrade. High definition is where the world is headed.”
Much of the controversy stemmed over the quality and cost of the individual cameras in the package.
Terry Nixon, a salesman for Austin-based Texas Media Systems, which sells broadcast video equipment to school districts, said the cameras Eanes bought are more expensive than the ones in use at the University of Texas. Texas Media Systems did not submit a bid on the Eanes HD video package.
Nixon said one of his clients, the University of Texas, uses HD video cameras costing $10,000 to $20,000. He said the level of equipment detailed in the HD video package was not typical of school district purchases and that there were other much less expensive options available for educational purposes.
“There are some highly unusual, expensive components in there,” he said. “The cost of this equipment seems inappropriate for a school in normal circumstances. This is the kind of stuff that ESPN might buy.”
Garry Wilkison of Austin Digital Media is a local video equipment and technology consultant working with the Austin Independent School District. He said that the problem for school districts today is that there is no mid-level broadcast HD video equipment available.
“There is a lot of lower-end HD equipment on the market and then there is the real expensive studio camera equipment. There just aren’t any mid-level cameras out there right now. It’s a real problem within the industry right now.”
Fries said the school district had many other areas where the $600,000 plus money could be more prudently spent.
“It is unthinkable that a school district would approve such lavish acquisitions when their campuses are not ADA compliant, when their facilities manager tells the board he’s literally holding infrastructure together with duct tape and when our schools have serious health and safety problems that have been identified by the district’s own experts.”
Wellman said that funding technology, funding ADA access renovation and planning and funding for facilities maintenance were all separate and important issues.
“We are committed to supporting programs that meet the needs of our students, and there are many ways that we have been able to do that with this (most recent) bond program,” she said. “Some examples include the new Research Center or library at the high school and hundreds of accessibility improvements district-wide, including major upgrades in the Performing Arts Center.”
Not a surprise.
Let me get this straight.
We’re in a near economic depression and we decide to spend $700k on HD cameras that no one has but ESPN?
Whoever sold this this bill of goods to the district is one heck of a salesman because there isn’t anyone else buying these high dollar cameras, especially for high schools.
Maybe I can hire them to film my kids wedding in the summer!
Gosh, spending in excess of $400,000 on 4 HD video cameras for high school students in the current economy, and perhaps at any time, when there are teachers and students, handicapped or otherwise, with great needs seems extremely unfair and short sighted. My understanding is that we have expanding teacher/student ratios at Eanes Elementary School. The district is not ADA compliant. Are we a district of technology and turf, or of teachers and students. This is not how I want my tax dollars spent. Count me firmly on the side of Mr. Fries.
To the distinguished members of the EISD Board,
$700K on video equipment, yikes! And I hear rumblings of yet another Bond proposal in the works after the $53million from the current is all spent!!! Is that right?
With all due respect – “What is your justification?” Yet again, I am disappointed in the Board. The price we are paying to be able to walk away with a tape at the end of a performance is too high for the current times.
What is the process? So, the Board can approve such items without the Bond committee’s yeah or nay? To which body do we appeal to enforce accountability?
If we are really big on bringing the district’s technology up, get more laptops into classrooms. My kid most often says that she has to wait her turn w/ only two laptops in the classroom.
The latest email on School Bus survey left a lot to be desired – there is a guardian per Family that’s chosen somehow and only one parent can complete this survey online! None could answer how this choice was made. Perhaps the technology used here is outdated?!
Regards,
Pushpa
Must be a Democrate majority board flowing in the tail wind of the Obama ‘Pork’ spending agenda.
Obviously not much ‘oversight’ has been put into the purchase of this equipment. Had there been, they would realize that there is high quality equipment at a much lower cost. An example for cameras:
http://pro.sony.com/bbsc/productComparisonChart.do?URL=/bbsc/ssr/micro-xdcam/cat-broadcastcameras/&models=PDW700,PDWF335L
Even if you were to add a $20,000 lens to the camera, it would still be half the price of what EISD is buying! And this is just ONE example!
Omega Broadcast Group isn’t going to talk them into anything other than the high end
equipment…….can you blame them……more money for them.
In a tight financial market as we are in now, not to mention much more important spending items needing attention and the district not even being ADA compliant, what are they doing??
Come on guys……get real!
Can the board explain how $600,000 in technology for the Jumbotron and auditorium improves the reading, writing, math and science skills of my kids and prepares them for college? It may be hard to believe, but some of us aren’t in Eanes for football.
Not too long ago a member of the Chaps Club responded to a remark made about ‘keeping up with the Jones’. He said, “We ARE the Jones!”
Nice. As the Chaps Club already collects the funds generated by advertisements sold on the Jumbotron (signs on stadium, public parking spaces etc.), why aren’t they underwriting the costs associated with the purchase of this high end equipment? Who will benefit from the money generated by this new state of the art upgrade?
To my knowledge, there has been very little if any, discussion in open session board meetings relating to the many other district wide needs that should have been considered when determining how to spend this enormous sum of money. Failure to include members of the community in the process prior to posting the action item on the most recent agenda, seems a bit suspect. It’s unfortunate the seven elected members of the Eanes Board of Trustees voted to honor our superintendent’s recommendation to spend these public funds on items so outrageous. Their vote does nothing more than drive home what appears to be their continuing intentional indifference to the academic and ADA deficiencies still present and growing in Eanes ISD. Thank you Mr. Fries for your efforts to investigate and shed light on this issue for our taxpaying community.
Come on people, PRIORITIES!! These kids are our future, how will they ever learn what’s important for learning if the adults are running amok with the funds. As far as the sidewalk issue-shame on you for ignoring this problem. Spend a day on crutches, walker or wheelchair and a sidewalk becomes the gateway to so many things that the rest of us take for granted.
If nothing is done to correct this flagrant breach of fiduciary duty, then for every one of the people speaking up now there will likely be 200 others, like me, who will simply speak with their vote at the next Board election. I am usually one to give broad deference to decisions of elected officials, but this is beyond explanation and perhaps even worthy of an investigation into whether there are any connections between the vendors and those in positions within EISD.
Don’t forget the MILLIONS of our bond money spent last year for three fields of artificial turf, $317,000 for a batting cage for two … and the many years that this site has documented the problem.
http://www.keepeanesinformed.com/new_jumbotron_2009.htm
Check it out here: http://www.keepeanesinformed.com
Say it with your vote, parents. Say it with your pen. Say it with your attendance at board meetings. Let this passion be heard in the only language that matters these days….your vote and your pocket book. Come to the next Board Meeting March 25th. Write your Board Members and your state representatives. Rally the troops. Email me if you’d like more info on this movement to refocus EISD spending back where it belongs….maintaining the quality of our teachers and reducing class sizes.
Julia@rarejules.com
My family has lived in Eanes for over 18 years, sent two children through all grade levels (2005 and 2008 graduates) and have one remaining in middle school. We are so tired of the board NEVER changing its priorities from advancing athletics (particularly football) at the expense of all other programs. When my son was in the high school debate program, I had to purchase used sofas and chairs for the students to sit on and conduct practice debates. There were no existing pieces of furniture in the practice room when he joined debate. Just one example of where these facility funds could be responsibly spent…instead of FOOTBALL! Get over your fascination with Westlake high school football and finally grow up, school board!!! Lynne & Wes Hook
It is definitely time for a new board to be elected. This board is out of date and out of touch. Down with the aging out of touch board, long live the new board. The new board that cares about students and teachers and ideas and caring for others less fortunate than ourselves. Down with the Football obsessed board. Jezz, is that all we are, South Lake Carrol South??
It is time for new blood on the board – are you with me?
Mark