Title
Replacement/Upgrade of Obsolete and Aging City Commission Auditorium Broadcast Cameras, Projectors, Broadcast Switcher and Associated Broadcast Support Equipment (B)
This item is a request for the City Commission to authorize the purchase of broadcast equipment from Encore Broadcast Solutions, Inc. as a specified source to replace obsolete broadcast cameras, multimedia projectors, broadcast switcher and associated broadcast equipment.
Explanation
The City of Gainesville and Alachua County jointly operate the community's local government access channel, commonly referred to as Community 12TV. While providing scheduled program coverage of City Commission, and other city meetings on cable television and by online video stream, City Communications staff has identified significant operational problems caused by aging, and in some cases, obsolete broadcast system equipment.
The audio, video and projection systems in the city auditorium have had individual equipment components replaced over the past several years. However, system cameras were originally purchased in 2003 and many other system components are similarly out dated. The result has been a continual slow degradation of the quality of the city's analog broadcast signal. Images captured by broadcast cameras reflect distorted and unbalanced color spectrums that are very noticeable as shots change from camera to camera and attempts to repair and adjust camera color balance work only temporarily.
Antiquated camera controller motors cannot hold steady camera shots and operators are forced to compensate to prevent camera drift off of subjects. The overhead document camera performance is inadequate and presentation documents images are often unreadable. Repair of this obsolete equipment is becoming increasing frequent and vendors have indicated that soon they will no longer provide support for repair of our current cameras.
Additionally, current auditorium projectors lack the lumen intensity and image sharpness necessary to provide detailed, accurate images that would enable the City Commission and program viewers to see smaller images and read presentations with smaller fonts.
City Communications staff has identified appropriate broadcast equipment to replace current aging equipment. Staff continues to execute a long-term plan to enable the analog City broadcast signal to convert at some future point, to a high definition digital broadcast signal.
This is a project request for approval of a specified source method of purchasing from Encore Broadcast Solutions, Inc. Encore was previously selected to provide new equipment used to rebuild the broadcast system head-end equipment after existing equipment was destroyed in a basement flood in December 2007. The company has provided excellent service support for the equipment they provided and they have been diligent in the performance and execution of their purchase agreement with the City.
New systems equipment purchases must properly interface and be compatible with the current head-end equipment and meet accepted broadcast industry standards. Encore Broadcast Solutions, Inc. is familiar with both, city and county broadcast equipment, service needs, and service response time requirements.
Included in this packet is a copy of the Alachua County invoice for the purchase of the same Panasonic cameras that are specified for this equipment purchase. Also, the Alachua County Emergency Operations Center invoice is provided for the purchase of the same Sanyo projectors that are specified for this purchase. Purchasing the same equipment as used by Alachua County will provide Community 12 TV and our live online video streams with a consistent level of high quality signals as on-air programming switches from City to County and back again.
Fiscal Note
This purchase is not to exceed $85,000, with funding available through Cox capital grant funds and allocated funds in the 2011 Communications Office budget.
Recommendation
The City Commission: 1) approve the purchase of identified broadcast equipment by specified source from Encore Broadcast Solutions, Inc.; 2) authorize the City Manager to execute the purchase contract, subject to approval of the City Attorney as to form and legality; and 3) issue a purchase order in an amount not to exceed $85,000.