City of Huntingburg Refreshes City Council Chambers

The City of Huntingburg recognized the need to modernize its City Council Hearing Room to better support public engagement, accessibility, and comply with new state laws requiring streaming and recording public hearings. With limited legacy tools and growing community expectations around transparency and accessibility, Huntingburg partnered with state approved vendor River Systems to reimagine its audio, video, and presentation capabilities.

Challenges
The city faced several technology constraints. Outdated audio components hampered clarity for both in-room participants and remote attendees. Manual camera operation made capturing dynamic council proceedings cumbersome and inconsistent. Presentation tools lacked the flexibility needed for modern workflows, especially in an increasingly mobile-first environment. Additionally, setup and operation for each council meeting for each city department required hands-on support from the IT staff which strained their resources.

Solution

Before the upgrade, staff had to manually position cameras, connect laptops with various adapters, troubleshoot audio inconsistencies, and later spend time manually transcribing and cleaning up recordings. Now, with the push of one button, the meetings are streamed, automated cameras track speakers on their own, wireless presentation eliminates setup hassles, and audio is captured cleanly through push-to-talk microphones—reducing pre-meeting prep significantly.

Even more impactful, the integration with Zoom automates recording and transcription. Staff no longer need to transcribe meeting minutes by hand and they have added closed captions or language translations to their hearings. Everything is captured in real time, stored in one platform, and ready to share shortly after the meeting ends.

All of this means fewer errors, faster turnaround, and more bandwidth for staff to support broader civic engagement efforts.

Conclusion
By partnering with River Systems, the City of Huntingburg has created a future-ready, inclusive space for civic participation. The new system underscores how strategic technology investments can significantly enhance operational efficiency, resident engagement, and public access to local government.