Austin residents may soon have the ability to stream and watch City Council meetings online.

City Council members discussed a possible overhaul to the current City Hall audio visual system Monday night at a work session.

Although no formal action was taken, most council members were on board with the idea, which would cost around $110,000.

However, the City of Austin would not have to foot the entire bill. According to Tom Dankert, director of administrative services, most of the upgrade would be paid for by a cable access fee available through the city’s general fund. The $86,000 that would come from the fund can only be used for improvements to the system. The extra $24,000 would come from the city’s contingency fund.

Some of the proposed changes include a new 70-inch flat screen television mounted behind the mayor’s seat, two 60-inch flat screen TVs replacing the two older TVs in Council Chambers, a new speaker system, new microphones, 22-inch monitors at council work stations, the availability of a computer hookup for PowerPoint presentations and complete replacement of the equipment in the control room.

The plan includes funding for new high definition quality cameras to replace the four lower quality security cameras that are used to film meetings.

The new equipment would allow City Council meetings, as well as any other meetings held in Council Chambers, to be streamed live online. An archive of videos from meetings would also be available online.

Members also discussed the possibility of switching to paperless agendas, both for environmental and budget reasons. City staff priced eight laptop computers with wireless at around $12,300. If the city goes forward with a plan that includes laptops, the computers would most likely stay at City Hall and be used for official meetings and business only.

Second Ward council member Steve King was in favor of the switch at Monday night’s work session.

“Every one of us goes through the (agenda) at the end of the night and puts everything in the recycle bin,” he said, giving an example of how much paper is used and discarded after a meeting.

However, Second Ward council member Roger Boughton was concerned that the computers would just be “another thing to lug around.” Concern was also voiced regarding the maintenance of the laptops. Council members were worried the initial cost plus upkeep would not outweigh the benefits of dumping paper agendas.

City Council members took no formal action regarding the paperless agendas.