An "eyebrow raising" story from the Huntington Herald Dispatch by former State Journal reporter and UK Journalism grad McKenna Horsley.

It seems that during recent West Virginia public agency meetings, officials exchanged texts (some originating from outside "interested parties").

Horsley writes:

"The texts during the meeting were eyebrow-raising but not illegal.

"State law requires government entities such as city councils to hold open, or public, meetings so taxpayers and others can observe as public business is conducted.

"But state open meetings law predates modern technology, meaning it does not contemplate texting or use of messaging apps that allow elected officials to carry on private conversations when their deliberations are supposed to be public. The practice does not violate current council rules. It shows that during meetings some people have access to council members outside public comment."

An expert on WV open government laws, West Virginia University law professor Patrick McGinley, knows of no legal prohibition:

"'This is really a situation that I haven't seen before, and there's no judicial interpretation about anything like this … case, opinions,' he said. 'And there's nothing specifically in the West Virginia open meetings law that addresses something like this.'"

Kentucky's open meetings law clearly prohibits texting among public officials about public business during public meetings. The law requires all agencies to "provide meeting room conditions, including adequate space, seating, and acoustics, which insofar as is feasible allow effective public observation of the public meetings."

https://apps.legislature.ky.gov/law/statutes/statute.aspx?id=42577

"Observation" has long been construed to mean the ability to both see and hear what is transpiring at a public meeting. This was confirmed in the 2013 amendment to the law requiring adequate acoustics.

In 2001, the Kentucky attorney general determined that officials who whispered to each other about public business during a public meeting violated the open meetings law. Text messaging is equivalent to electronic whispering. Like whispering, texting abridges the public's right to hear what is transpiring.

https://ag.ky.gov/Priorities/Government-Transparency/orom/2001/01OMD110…

Aside from messages that were deleted — another serious problem with unauthorized texting — Horsley obtained copies of the text messages themselves under West Virginia's open records laws.

Sadly, she might not have been so lucky in Kentucky.

A series of disastrous open records decisions recently issued by Attorney General Daniel Cameron casts doubt on Kentuckians' right of access to similar "secret discussion of public business" if the officials transmit the texts on private devices or accounts.

https://www.facebook.com/419650175248377/posts/972201186659937/?d=n

Any advantage Kentucky's open government law has over West Virginia's open government law is therefore a wash.