COUNCIL VIDEOTAPE DELETIONS AN ERROR : PORTIONS OF CITY COUNCIL TAPE DELETED INADVERTENTLY.

Byline: Enrique Rivero Daily News Staff Writer

Concerned that portions of council meetings are missing from videos appearing on TOTV, Councilwoman Elois Zeanah asked for city staff to investigate.

The city's findings? The deletions are isolated glitches and human error.

Zeanah notes that her comments criticizing Mayor Andrew Fox's ballot measure to require a public vote on some General Plan amendments were cut from the video of that meeting. In addition, the councilwoman said that some council videos are interrupted by public service announcements and programming before returning in midmeeting. Also, some residents' comments have disappeared.

``My comments just completely disappeared where I started requesting that the Fox ballot measure not be rushed because it had loopholes,'' Zeanah said Wednesday. ``They were completely cut - they just completely disappeared - then the tape picked up at the end of the next agenda item.

``The policy is there, but somehow it's not being implemented,'' she said.

According to a report written by the Media Services Department in response to Zeanah's concerns, tapes of City Council meetings are never edited.

Any deletions are mere mechanical or human errors, the report states.

So why did Zeanah's July 2 comments disappear? It was an oversight by Media Services staff who inadvertently noted an incorrect duration time on the tape, resulting in nearly 30 minutes that failed to make television screens, according to the report.

There have been other instances where the sophisticated video playback unit has failed, resulting in other inadvertent deletions, the report said.

For the most part, however, the machines have worked well, the report showed. For example, only five of the nearly 1,300 programs broadcast in June did not play in their entirety, for a .004 percent error rate, the report noted.

``City Council policy for TOTV is gavel-to-gavel coverage of City Council meetings,'' read a July 11 memo from the Media Services Department. ``Staff firmly follows this policy and never edits council meetings.''

The Fox measure, to appear on the November ballot, if passed would require a public vote on any land use changes that would increase residential or commercial densities beyond what is currently prescribed in the General Plan.

The measure in effect would help protect open space, Fox has said.

Zeanah has criticized the measure as ineffectual.

Though the council voted unanimously Tuesday night to direct staff to follow the policy, Councilwoman Judy Lazar said there is no problem and charged Zeanah with overstating the problem. Lazar herself has never heard residents complain that their comments have been deleted, she said.

``There are glitches and there are some people who think they're being edited out of the tapes,'' Lazar said. ``Frankly I don't believe that.''

COUNCIL ACTION AT A GLANCE The Thousand Oaks City Council took the following action Tuesday night:

LIGHTING - Voted unanimously to postpone until after the Nov. 5 election a decision on whether to form a citywide lighting and landscaping assessment district. Council members are waiting to see if the Right to Vote on Taxes Act is approved by California voters.

MALL - Unanimously denied without prejudice a proposal by Glendale-based Newbury Park Group to tear down the aging Newbury Park Center in the 1700 block of Newbury Road and replace it with a 91,000-square-foot entertainment and retail complex. A denial without prejudice allows the developer to return to the city with an altered version of the proposal.

GOLF - Postponed until July 23 a decision on whether to authorize staff to relocate and fence the driving range at the Los Robles Greens and to proceed with bidding and awarding the contract for the work.

SOURCE: City of Thousand Oaks

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Box: COUNCIL ACTION AT A GLANCE (see text)