Request By:
Mr. Leland Gregory
Superintendent
Hart County Schools
Munfordville, Kentucky 42765
Opinion
Opinion By: Robert F. Stephens, Attorney General; By: Carl Miller, Assistant Attorney General
You have requested an opinion of the Attorney General pertaining to the Kentucky Open Meetings Law. Your question is stated as follows:
"Please give an opinion as to whether a board of education would be excluded from the requirements of KRS 61.815 when discussing pending litigation not relative to students. If so, may actual voting take place, concerning the pending litigation, in a closed session and at what point in time must the minutes be made public?"
KRS 61.815, the statute about which you inquire, sets forth the procedure to be followed when a public agency goes into closed session. The statute provides, however, that the procedure does not have to be followed when the subject of the meeting is pending litigation against or on behalf of a public agency. KRS 61.810(3). It does not make any difference what the subject of the litigation is.
When a closed meeting is held on the subject of proposed or pending litigation the provisions of KRS 61.815 do not apply and therefore a final vote may be taken in a closed session. The minutes of the closed session should be made available to the public as soon as practicable and when the revelation of the minutes will not defeat the purpose for the holding of the closed session. When an agency is a party, either plaintiff or defendant, in litigation it has the right to keep its litigation strategy confidential when necessary. We believe that this is the legislative intent of the exception to the closed meeting requirement of the statute.