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Chester BOE violated OMA - twice

Posted May 20, 2016 11:00 pm

By Pete Spitler Staff Writer

Delayed by a switch in attorneys and a 21-day extension, the answer finally came for the Herald Tribune.

In a five-page determination letter released Friday afternoon, the Public Access Bureau of the Illinois Attorney General's Office ruled that the Chester District 139 Board of Education violated the Open Meetings Act during both its January and February meetings by holding discussions that should have been made public in closed (executive) session.

An email seeking comment sent to Interim Superintendent Rick Goodman has not yet been returned. After Tuesday's meeting of the board, board President Mitch Hammel announced that he and Goodman would no longer answer questions after meetings.

"With some of the issues lately, it seems like every time we turn around, we have to call our lawyer," Hammel said. "That is costing us money. We don't want answers getting out in haste."

Going forward, Hammel said questions either have to be written down or emailed to Goodman.

The Herald Tribune submitted a Request for Review with the PAB on February 19 regarding the executive sessions of both the board's January 21 and Feb. 18 meetings.

The newspaper alleged that the board improperly discussed two topics in separate executive sessions - changing athletic conferences during its Jan. 21 meeting and scheduling changes at Chester High School during its Feb. 18 meeting.

In regard to the January 21 meeting, PAB Chief Sarah L. Pratt wrote that the board discussed eight different topics during an hour and 15-minute executive session.

Pratt wrote that some of the discussion - reportedly involving four separate positions - directly related to the agenda item listed for the executive session, which was "To discuss the compensation, discipline, performance or dismissal of specific employees of the public body."

But a "significant portion" of the session involved discussing the possibility of changing athletic conferences, which the PAB ruled is outside the scope of things that can be discussed in executive session.

During media availability after the meeting, Goodman confirmed the athletic conferences topic was discussed during executive session.

"Just briefly, there's too many unknown factors about it," said Goodman at the time. "One school moves to this conference, would it cause it do something else in another conference?

"We just need some clarity on what's going to happen with those schools like that."

But Pratt also found fault with other topics discussed during the executive session.

"In addition, the Board discussed funding for certain additions and improvements, topics that are clearly outside the scope of (to discuss the compensation, discipline, performance or dismissal of specific employees of the public body) and should not have been discussed in closed session, as well as a student discipline matter," Pratt wrote. "Although the discussion of student discipline in a closed meeting is authorized by another exception, that section was not publicly cited prior to entering closed session and a vote to enter closed session under that exemption was not recorded in the meeting minutes."

In reviewing the Feb. 18 meeting of the board, Pratt determined that the majority of the executive session was devoted to the financial status of the district and possible changes relating to the high school, also outside the scope of topics that can be discussed in closed session.

"The focus of this discussion was not the employment of individual employees, but rather potential changes in general and how those might affect the budget," Pratt wrote. "As previously explained, section 2(c)(1) exemption does not authorize the discussion of underlying budgetary matters, curriculum changes and scheduling changes, even though those decisions may ultimately affect individual employees."

The PAB also took issue with how the closed session minutes were recorded.

"The executive session minutes supplied by the board for both the January 21, 2016 and February 18, 2016 meetings are extremely brief, consisting almost entirely of single-sentence descriptions of matters discussed," Pratt wrote. "In particular, the January 21, 2016 closed session minutes mention only three of the topics that were discussed.

"This office determines that these brief, very general minutes are insufficient to satisfy the requirements of (OMA)."

Pratt later determined that due to the inadequacy of the minutes, unless they were amended, the board can not properly vote to destroy the verbatim recordings.

Pratt wrote that to remedy the violations, the PAB requested the Board of Education make available to the public the portions of its closed session recordings that discuss matters outside the topics allowable under OMA.

The PAB determined a binding decision would not be required to resolve the matter and that its letter closes its investigation.

During the time that the Herald Tribune was awaiting a determination letter from the PAB, the Chester Board of Education had two meetings, in March and on Tuesday, during which an executive session item was listed that involved the discussion of litigation.

Following both meetings, Goodman confirmed that the reasoning for that item was the Herald Tribune's OMA inquiry.

In an emailed response to a request for comment by the newspaper on Wednesday, he wrote that there would be no comment from the district moving forward.

The Herald Tribune electronically filed another Request for Review on Saturday with the PAB that alleges that since the bureau's determination is not a binding decision, it is not considered "litigation" and therefore, not eligible to be discussed in executive session.

In addition, the newspaper will file a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request with the district for access to the portions of the closed session recordings that should have been made public.

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