Request By:
Mark York, News Reporter
WIEL AM
Box L
Elizabethtown, Kentucky 42701
Opinion
Opinion By: Steven L. Beshear, Attorney General; By: Carl T. Miller, Jr., Assistant Attorney General
You have requested an opinion of the Attorney General on the Kentucky Open Meetings Law KRS 61.805 - 61.850, on the following related facts:
"For the past few years, students residing within the boundaries of the Hardin County School District have been allowed to attend classes at schools within the Elizabethtown Independent District, and vice-versa. For the 1982-83 school year, there are over 400 'county' students attending the Elizabethtown schools. The students are allowed to attend by a mutual contract agreement between the Elizabethtown Independent School Board and the Hardin County Board of Education.
On Monday, October 11, 1982, the Hardin County School Board refused to accept the contract offer from the Elizabethtown Board of Education to allow the county students to attend the city schools. County school board members asked for, and received, a commitment from the Elizabethtown School Board, for a 'joint' meeting
Representatives from both systems have publicly stated that the meeting should be held in 'closed' session, because 'personnel' and 'possible litigation' matters pertaining to the situation will be discussed. Both of those reasons are two of the five exemptions allowed under the Kentucky Revised Statutes that permit public bodies to hold closed meetings.
I would like to have an opinion rendered on a 'joint' meeting between the Hardin County Board of Education and the Elizabethtown Independent Board of Education; the legal requirements for holding such a meeting as they pertain to the open meetings law; and any exemption that would permit a session closed to the public."
Any review of a question concerning the meetings of a public agency must begin with the premise that meetings of public agencies generally are required to be open to the public. Closed sessions should be rarely held and when they are held they are to deal only with one or more of the subject matter exceptions provided in KRS 61.810 and convened according to the procedures set forth in KRS 61.815. The statutory requirements apply whether the meeting is of a quorum of one public agency or a joint meeting of a quorum each of two public agencies.
Your letter states that representatives of the two school boards proposing to meet in joint session have stated that the meeting should be held in closed session because "personnel" and "possible litigation" will be discussed. That assertion calls for consideration of the following portion of KRS 61.810:
"All meetings of a quorum of the members of any public agency at which any public business is discussed or at which any action is taken by such agency, are declared to be public meetings, open to the public at all times, except for the following:
* * *
(3) Discussions of proposed or pending litigation against or on behalf of the public agency.
* * *
(6) Discussions or hearings which might lead to the appointment, discipline or dismissal of an individual employee, member or student without restricting that employee's, member's or student's right to a public hearing if requested, provided that this exception is designed to protect the reputation of individual persons and shall not be interpreted to permit discussion of general personnel matters in secret. "
The litigation exception would apply to a joint meeting of two public agencies when they are involved in a law suit or when they are involved in proposed or pending litigation.
In interpreting the Open Meetings Law we have occasionally felt it appropriate to publish the preamble of House Bill 100, 1974, which was enacted to create the law. Although the preamble is not a part of the statute, it is helpful in determining the legislative intent when interpreting the statutes as codified. It reads as follows:
"Whereas it is the policy of the Commonwealth that the formation of public policy is public business and may not be conducted in secret; and
Whereas, the legislature finds and declares that public agencies in this Commonwealth exist to aid in the conduct of the public's business; and
Whereas the people of this Commonwealth do not yield their soverignty to the agencies which serve them; the people, in delegating authority, do not give their public servants the right to decide what is good for the public to know and what is not good for them to know; the people insist on remaining informed so they may retain control over the instruments they have created."
In regard to the personnel exception in the Open Meetings Law, KRS 61.810(6), which we have quoted above, the statute expressly states that a closed session must deal with an "individual employee, member or student," the exception is designed to protect the reputation of individual persons and shall not be interpreted to permit discussion of general personnel matters in secret.
In reference to the issue facing the Elizabethtown Independent School District and the Hardin County Board of Education the placement of over 400 students will surely affect the employment and assignment of professional personnel in the two school districts, however, the issue is a general personnel matter and is, therefore, forbidden to be discussed in secret. Such a personnel problem does not involve the reputation of individual persons.