Zoom
Council President Mick McGarry wrestles with Zoom.
Three days after internet trolls forced a Hamden Legislative Council meeting to shut down, legislators took up their computers again Thursday in a valiant effort to forge ahead with town business … only to be thwarted once more, not by “Zoom bombers” this time, but by Zoom itself.
Hamden’s quest to conduct business over the Zoom teleconferencing app has been reminiscent of a horse-drawn carriage clopping up the on ramp to the I‑91-I-95 interchange. Like the carriage, the council is an apparatus ill-equipped for the age of the internet. And like the interchange, Zoom is a technology of modern times that lacks efficacy.
On Monday, the council attempted to hold a meeting to approve an ordinance allowing the mayor to spend money on Covid-19 expenses, another allowing the town to receive pandemic-related donations, and a few more minor items. Council President Mick McGarry had not even opened the meeting when a “Zoom bomber” blew up the chat function with racist and homophobic slurs. He had to cancel the meeting and reschedule.
The meeting was first rescheduled for Tuesday. It was then rescheduled again for Thursday to give ample time for residents to get used to the new emailed public input format.
The beginning of Thursday’s meeting wasn’t smooth, but it was free of racist slurs and internet trolls. Finance Director Curtis Eatman spent about ten minutes unable to join the meeting. McGarry waited a few minutes for him, and then started the meeting without him hoping he would manage to join by the time he was needed.
Clerk Kim Renta began to take the roll.
“Ms. Baez?”
Silence. Council member Dominique Baez had been on the line just a minute earlier.
“She’s with us,” said Renta. “Ms. Baez?” Silence. Renta moved on. She finished the roll.
Under God With Liberty God And Liberty
Next, the Pledge of Allegiance was a tinny cacophony of national pride: “One nation one nation, under nation under god, with under god with liberty god and liberty and justice for god with liberty and justice for all for all.”
Eatman had still not made it onto the call. McGarry asked Director of Legislative Affairs Walter Morton for help. “Mr. Morton, are you in contact with Mr. Eatman?” he asked.
Silence.
“Mr. Morton?” They’d lost him, too.
McGarry read two letters of public input, and then introduced the minutes of a few previous meetings for approval. They were the only successful votes of the evening.
Finally, Eatman managed to get on the call. The council was in the midst of discussing an ordinance allowing the town to accept pandemic-related donations, when 7 p.m. rolled around. There was a public hearing on the mayor’s proposed budget scheduled for then, and the council had to recess its meeting to conduct the hearing. It would then resume the meeting after.
McGarry recessed the meeting, closing the Zoom meeting. He opened a different Zoom meeting using a different link. For two hours he read over 100 pages of letters from residents in a voice like that of a sleep-deprived father reading the same bedtime story he had read to his kids every night for years, despite his pleas that they choose absolutely anything else.
After page 116 of letters, he closed the hearing at 9:08. The council would resume its previous meeting, at the previous Zoom link, at 9:20.
9:20 rolled around. If you clicked on the link, and it brought you to a page that said the meeting had expired. 9:25: the same. 9:30: still no luck.
The old Zoom link, which had been posted with the agenda for the meeting, could not be reopened. McGarry had to generate a new link, but it had not been posted to the website, so the council couldn’t get it out to the public. Zoom problems had thwarted the meeting once more.
The council will try again Friday at 5 p.m. Third time’s the charm.
Don't blame Zoom. These are all user errors. Hamden IT needs to train the members on how to use all of the features.