LAKE STATION | Randall Alexander said Wednesday he doesn't plan to stop videotaping City Council meetings, a practice he started two years ago.

He said he and his wife, Pat, who also videotapes some of the meetings, are the object of the council's recent discussion about a proposed ban. Alexander said he knows his rights and will mount a legal challenge if the council attempts to ban either his or his wife's videotaping of public meetings.

"I had already hired an attorney and was going to sue for $1.5 million. ... I knew what I was doing before I brought in my camera," he said.

Public Access Counselor Heather Willis Neal said if Alexander filed suit, he would likely win in any challenge.

She said the right to videotape public meetings is one that is backed by both the Open Door Law as well the Indiana Supreme Court.

Neal said the Indiana Supreme Court ruled in the 1989 case Berry vs. People's Broadcasting Corp. that videotaping is allowed at public meetings.

Alexander, who ran unsuccessfully in the primary for a Democratic at-large council seat, denies he edits or alters the videotapes of the meetings.

He said he only began videotaping the meetings because he had requested a copy of a cassette tape and the quality was terrible.

"By video recording, you can catch everything," he said.

He admits some of the events he has captured on videotape haven't always been that flattering and have included a councilman making an obscene gesture to Mayor Shirley Wadding as well as another councilman ranting and raving at her.

Some of the videotaping has occurred after the end of public meetings, which might put it in a gray area, Neal said.

"I have seen a local ordinance restricting videotaping prior to the meeting but nothing after," she said.

Alexander denies he plays the videotapes for amusement at local bars.

"I did show the videotape at the VFW one time but that was after City Councilman Todd Rogers requested it," he said.

Rogers, who called Alexander a liar, denies he viewed or requested viewing the videotape at the Veterans of Foreign Wars building.

He said he instead asked Alexander at a meeting what he does with the videotapes and never got an answer.

City Council President Keith Soderquist said the council may discuss the issue at its meeting tonight but, because of the need for further study, it has dropped from the agenda an ordinance prohibiting the use of recording, video and photographic devices at meetings.