Civic Capacity Mailbag

In today's Civic Capacity Mailbag, we talk about Executive Sessions

We open up our Civic Capacity mailbag to answer another question submitted by a loyal reader. It’s a timely question as we have been seeing our local government boards have these “Executive Sessions”.  Our reader asks what are these “Executive Sessions” and what are the reasons a local board can have them?

Nearly every board of every public body in Ohio is required to follow the state’s open meetings law, which is found in Section 121.22 of the Ohio Revised Code.  As part of that law, there are exceptions to open meetings, commonly referred to as Executive Sessions.  These sessions are times when the public is not invited to watch the deliberations of the public body and these sessions can only be held for very limited and specific purposes. These purposes include:

• Personnel Matters: An executive session can be held to discuss various personnel-related issues, such as the appointment, employment, dismissal, discipline, promotion, demotion, or compensation of public employees or officials. Discussions about investigating charges or complaints against public employees, officials, licensees, or regulated individuals are also permissible. However, such discussions cannot be conducted in private if the individual involved requests a public hearing. Notably, executive sessions cannot be used for disciplining elected officials for conduct related to their official duties or their removal from office.

• Property Transactions: City councils can hold executive sessions to consider matters related to property transactions. These include discussions about the purchase of property for public purposes, competitive bidding for property sales, or the sale of unneeded, obsolete, or unfit-for-use property. If disclosing information prematurely would provide an unfair advantage to private interests, an executive session may be conducted. It's prohibited for members of the council to misuse this provision to provide covert information to prospective buyers or sellers.

• Pending or Imminent Litigation: An executive session can be called to confer with an attorney regarding disputes involving the city council that are subject to pending or imminent court action.

• Collective Bargaining: City councils may hold executive sessions to prepare for, conduct, or review negotiations or bargaining sessions with public employees regarding their compensation or terms of employment.

• Confidential Matters: Matters required to be kept confidential under federal law, federal regulations, state statutes, or other legal provisions can be discussed in an executive session.

• Security and Emergency Protocols: Details concerning security arrangements and emergency response protocols for public bodies or offices can be discussed in an executive session if public disclosure would endanger the security of these entities.

• Trade Secrets: For certain types of hospitals operated under specific chapters of the Revised Code, executive sessions may be used to discuss trade secrets as defined by relevant statutes.

• Economic Development Assistance: In cases involving economic development assistance, discussions about confidential information related to marketing plans, business strategies, trade secrets, or personal financial statements of an applicant can be held in an executive session. However, certain conditions must be met, including unanimous agreement among a quorum of the public body.

It's important to note that any executive session must adhere to the specified purpose and cannot be used to deliberate or make decisions outside the scope of the approved matters. Furthermore, proper notice and documentation of the session must be maintained in accordance with the Open Meetings Act to ensure transparency and accountability in government proceedings.

It’s also important to note that there are specific rules for these executive sessions.  Those that are in these sessions  are not free to discuss those items discussed within the session, in other words, what is said in the privacy of the executive session is meant to be kept in confidence.  Second, no votes are taken in the Executive Session; all votes that are taken as a result of the deliberations within these sessions must be made in an open meeting available to be attended by the public.

Thanks for your question about local government!  If you have a question, please feel free to ask by leaving a comment or sending an email to william.lutz17@gmail.com.