Public Body Violated OMA for Voting to Terminate Employment after Failing to Provide Sufficient Advance Notice on the Board’s Meeting Agenda

A member of the public submitted a request for review to the Illinois Attorney General's Public Access Counselor's office (PAC) alleging that the Village of Okawville Board of Trustees (Board) violated the Open Meetings Act (OMA) section 2.02 of OMA (5 ILCS 120/) during a public meeting by terminating a police officer after failing to provide sufficient advance notice in the meeting agenda of the proposed termination action.  

Section 2.02(c) of OMA requires that a meeting agenda "set forth the general subject matter of any resolution or ordinance that will be the subject of final action at the meeting." This provision requires public bodies to include in agendas sufficient detail to notify members of the public of the types of final actions that public bodies anticipate taking at their meetings. The term “general subject matter” is ambiguous according to the PAC. Through legislative history, the PAC noted that the General Assembly chose to change in 2013 from the phrase, which had only required that an action be “germane to a subject on the agenda,” to “general subject matter.” At a minimum, section 2.02(c) requires the Board's agenda to include the general category of employee and the general type of personnel transaction at issue. 

Section 2(c)(1) of OMA permits closed session discussion regarding "[t]he appointment, employment, compensation, discipline, performance, or dismissal of specific employees of the public body[.]" However, the Board's public recital before entering closed session, which is required by section 2a of OMA, has no relevance to whether the Board's meeting agenda provided sufficient advance notice as separately required by section 2.02(c) of OMA.

Here, the Board’s meeting agenda listed “Personnel Issues” under a heading for “Police & Liquor.” The agenda also contained a reference to holding a closed session to discuss “personnel” under the exception in section 2(c)(1) of OMA. There was no inclusion in the agenda of any advance notice that the Board would take action to terminate the employment of a police officer. The PAC surmised that a member of the public could only possibly discern from the combined information on the agenda that personnel issues about either a police or liquor employee or potential employee would be discussed by the Board during closed session regarding one of the employment actions under 2(c)(1).  

The PAC found that the meeting agenda did not set forth the general subject matter of the Board's vote to terminate the employment of a police officer. The agenda item identified neither the employee category at issue nor the type of personnel transaction to be considered by the Board. The PAC determined that a member of the public who read the agenda before the meeting would not have generally known what the Board would be acting upon, and therefore, the Board failed to provide sufficient advance notice for the termination of a police officer's employment as required by section 2.02(c). 

The PAC directed the Board to remedy this violation by re-voting on the termination of the employee after posting a meeting agenda that provides sufficient detail to identify the general subject of that final action. At a minimum, the PAC set the requirement that the Board should create a relevant agenda item that would identify the category of employee and the type of personnel action to be considered at the meeting. 

A copy of the decision can be found here.