Modern communications add to the difficulty of defining and enforcing the state's open meetings law.
A recent discussion between the Lawrence school board and the district's attorney again points out the difficulty and importance of monitoring the state's open meetings law.
It's often tempting to bypass public comment and possible dissension by discussing decisions in private and simply announcing them at a public meeting. But the purpose of the Kansas Open Meetings Law is to make sure business that affects the public is discussed and decided in public. The idea is to make elected officials accountable to the people they serve and whose tax money they spend.
The areas that can be discussed in private are relatively narrow and usually involve personnel issues or the purchase of property. Most citizens can understand why it's appropriate to keep some matters private. But it's also important for government officials to understand that the public's right to observe their government in action is more important than any inconvenience this law may cause to officeholders.
E-mail, for instance, is a tremendously convenient way to communicate. A decade ago, open meetings watchdogs were worried about phone calls between two or more members of a public body. E-mail makes such communications even easier and raises the potential for abuse of the open meetings law. It apparently isn't illegal for one official to send e-mail to other members, but if those members respond, they are starting a dialogue that could violate the law. Messages from one member could be forwarded by another member creating a sort of multi-person conversation. It would be easy (and relatively private, as long as someone didn't push the wrong button and route a message to an unintended source) for public officials to violate, if not the letter, at least the spirit of the open meetings law without detection.
Local attorney Pete Curran gave school board members good advice when he told them, "You need to make it a high priority to comply with the spirit of this law. If, in fact, it is not clear, I think it is better to fall on the side of public discussion."
It's not always easy for elected officials to draw the lines on what can be discussed in an executive session, and local school board members are taking the right action by trying to educate themselves about the open law. Although many elected officials depend on their professional staffs to help them make open meetings decisions, it is the board or commission members themselves who must pay a fine if a violation is proven.
For that reason, as well as for the benefit of their constituents, school board members and other elected officials must embrace the principle of open government and, as Curran advised, err on the side of public discussion if they are in doubt.
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