Mentor residents who have cut the cord can now watch the Mentor Channel on ROKU, Apple TV, and Chromecast as well as iOS and Android devices.
The Mentor Channel broadcasts Mentor City Council and Planning Commission meetings as well as a variety of other content. It is currently available to Mentor residents on Time Warner Channel 96.12 and U-Verse Channel 99 but satellite subscribers, as well as those receiving regular broadcasts, have not been able to watch it on their TVs until now.
“The way people are consuming their information has changed drastically over the past decade. This was a natural move that helps us reach our residents in a way that’s more convenient for them,” says Ante Logarusic, Community Relations Administrator.
The City hired MacMillan Interactive Communications of Los Angeles to develop the applications.
“MacMillan did a great job of delivering a clean interface that loads quickly. We’re looking at adding our channel to Amazon Fire and Samsung Smart TVs as soon as MacMillan irons out development agreements with those platforms,” he says.
These aren’t the only changes that viewers can expect.
“We are in the process of upgrading a lot of our broadcast equipment. We have some components which date back to the early 90s,” he says, “Right now, the video is a little pixelated because our signal is still being downscaled and some content is still in SD. This should resolve itself by the end of the year as we work towards wrapping up the conversion.”
The app is free and can be downloaded directly from ROKU, iTunes or Google Play by searching for “The Mentor Channel”. Download links are also available at www.thementorchannel.com.