The First Time I Saw a Consent Agenda in Action
Vol. IV, No. 16 - Watching the State Controlling Board is Something I Will Never Forget
I remember the first time I saw a consent agenda in action.
I was in Columbus, having recently submitted a grant application on behalf of the City of Piqua for an environmental assessment of the old Piqua Memorial Medical Center site. The team reviewing our project at the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency told us the application was approved — but it still needed to clear the State Controlling Board.
I had no idea what that was. So I drove to Columbus, thinking it might be worth showing up in person in case anyone had questions about the project.
The State Controlling Board meets in one of the committee hearing rooms at the Statehouse — a stately space that feels appropriately serious for state business. The board itself is made up of three state representatives and three state senators, chaired by the Director of the Office of Budget and Management. They serve as a final check on executive agency spending before money goes out the door.
When I sat down, I was handed an agenda. Not a one-pager. A document — pages long — listing funding requests from agencies across state government. Our grant was somewhere in the middle, assigned a number like everything else.
The chairman called the meeting to order and asked each member to identify any items they wanted to discuss further. Members called out a handful of numbers. Once the chairman had polled everyone, he said something like, “Motion for consent approval.” A quick motion, a second, and a vote. Done.
“If your number wasn’t called, you’re approved.”
One crack of the gavel. Millions of dollars in state spending, authorized in roughly three minutes.
Not wanting the drive to feel like a complete waste, I stayed to watch what an actual discussion looked like. What followed was a ten-minute debate about Youngstown State University’s request to purchase furniture for one of its buildings.
I sat there taking it all in. On one hand, government had just moved at breakneck speed — approving millions of dollars in the time it takes to drink a cup of coffee. On the other hand, a state representative was spending ten minutes talking about chairs at Youngstown State University. Welcome to the consent agenda.
What a Consent Agenda Is — and Isn’t
Consent agendas are tools used by local governments to streamline meetings. The idea is straightforward: lump routine, non-controversial items into a single motion and approve them all at once, reserving meeting time for items that actually need discussion.
Used correctly, that’s a reasonable approach. Used carelessly, it becomes a problem.
There is nothing in the Ohio Revised Code, or in most city charters, that expressly authorizes consent agendas for local governments. Silence in the Ohio Revised Code generally means it could be permitted in charter communities — but that permissiveness comes with some pretty serious conditions.
Those conditions were largely shaped by the Ohio Supreme Court’s ruling in State ex rel. Ames v. Portage County Board of Commissioners, which addressed whether a board violated the Open Meetings Act (ORC §121.22) by conducting business through a consent agenda without proper public deliberation. The court’s message was clear: consent agendas are not categorically prohibited, but they can constitute an Open Meetings Act violation if they effectively shield deliberation from public view.
The Ohio School Boards Association has developed practical guidance built around four standards that translate well to any public body:
Adopt a formal policy authorizing consent agenda use before implementing it
List each item separately with its full text — resolutions, reports, recommendations included
Announce items before the vote and allow any board member or member of the public to pull an item for separate discussion
Include the full text of all adopted items in the official minutes
That last point matters most. The public has a right to see how a public body conducts public business. Using a consent agenda to quietly move items through without opportunity for public input isn’t a procedural shortcut — it’s a transparency problem.
Local government works best when residents can follow what’s happening and why. The goal of the consent agenda should be to make meetings more efficient, not less visible.
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This Month, we are doing something different! We are partnering with the Troy-Miami County Public Library by using this platform to raise funds for the Dolly Partin Imagination Library locally here in Miami County! Through the Dolly Partin Imagination Library, children from birth to Kindergarten, can get a book delivered every month to their home at no cost.
And while Dolly is a huge help, she picks out the stories and she works with the publishers, there is still a local cost to the program. Your donations through our “Buy Me A Coffee Page” will help get these youngsters on the right track to a life-long love of reading!
Thanks to John, Kim and Rachelle for your recent donations to this effort. So far this month — 55 books have been purchased! Thank you!