North Shore Health continues to debate online options for board meetings
The North Shore Health hospital board made little progress in an ongoing discussion regarding the potential to host board meetings online for the public, either through livestreaming or available recordings.
Board Member Sam Usem has pushed the subject since becoming a board member at the start of the year.
In March, the board voted unanimously to establish a subcommittee to evaluate the topic and present its findings at the April board meeting. Usem delivered a proposal, but the board had many of the same questions regarding cost and legal hurdles, though Board Chair Randy Wiitala said it was a “good start.”
“I have a lot questions about this yet,” Board Treasurer Patty Winchell-Dahl said when reviewing Usem’s proposal. “There’s cost of the equipment, cost of staffing, and cost of storing it.”
Winchell-Dahl and Board Clerk Steve Frykman also cited concerns with the legal requirements of hosting a livestream of their board meetings.
“There’s no statute in federal law or Minnesota law that requires recording or streaming of any information,” Wiitala said. “Any time we put a process in place and it gets embedded in the organization, there’s administrative overhead that, while on the surface may not look complicated, it could get complicated.”
“I would welcome feedback,” Usem said in response to Winchell-Dahl. “The reason I’m a little frustrated is that we’re making this a much harder deal than I think it is.”
Usem pointed out that the hospital already has people joining their meetings remotely using the service Zoom. This would mean that recording meetings is possible using the existing technology. The hospital also has a YouTube page where meetings could be hosted at no additional cost.
Usem welcomed a legal review of the recording of meetings, but urged the board to move quickly, hoping that meetings could become available online to the public within the next two months.
Winchell-Dahl questioned whether recording the meetings was even necessary, given that WTIP had recorded the meetings in March and April.
“I think it’s hard to measure administrative burden,” board member Milan Schmidt said, “But it is also hard to measure community benefit.”
North Shore Health CEO Kimber Wraalstad expressed interest in working with Usem and the hospital’s legal counsel to explore further the option of livestreaming meetings or making recordings available to the public.
A community member spoke during the scheduled listening portion of the meeting, stating that while there was no law requiring the meetings to be recorded, there was also no law prohibiting the recording of meetings.
North Shore Health currently schedules meetings in locations throughout Cook County to allow members who are further from Grand Marais to attend board meetings. However, Wiitala told WTIP in March that these meetings have had little participation.
North Shore Health Board meetings are typically held on Thursdays, with the public portion commencing at 9:30 a.m. The meetings can last several hours, with public comments scheduled in the middle of the meeting.
WTIP recorded the April 17 board meeting. Those recordings can be found below.
Josh Hinke April 19, 2025
