New N.D. Attorney General opinions Wednesday, May 12, 2021
Attorney General Wayne Stenehjem has issued two open meetings opinions and an open records opinion.
The Finley-Sharon-Hope-Page (FSHP) Cooperative committee held a meeting in December, 2020, but posted the meeting notice only on the front door of the Finley-Sharon Public School. Separately, the Hope-Page School Improvement & Co-curricular (SICC) committee held a special meeting on January 4, 2021. A co-op board is a public entity subject to the open meetings law, so it was the responsibility of the FSHP co-op board, not the school board, to provide notice of the co-op board’s meetings. The SICC committee, however, is a committee of the Hope-Page School Board. The Board violated the open meetings law when it failed to post notice of the January 4, 2021 special meeting.
Read the opinion at: https://attorneygeneral.nd.gov/sites/ag/files/documents/Opinions/2021/OR-OM/2021-O-03.pdf
The City of Surrey held a special meeting to discuss a protocol for handling complaints. The city posted a meeting notice listing the date and time but not the location of the special meeting. At the beginning of the meeting, the Mayor read a lengthy prepared statement that was not included on the meeting notice. The meeting then continued with the items listed on the notice. Meeting notices must include the location of the meeting. For a special meeting, only the items listed on the meeting notice may be discussed. In both respects, the city violated the law. After the meeting adjourned, three council members continued discussions of public business, which discussions they memorialized in writing at the city’s November regular meeting. The council members had not been delegated any authority nor did they comprise a quorum of the seven-member council. Therefore, their discussions were not subject to the open meetings law.
Read the opinion at: https://attorneygeneral.nd.gov/sites/ag/files/documents/Opinions/2021/OR-OM/2021-O-04.pdf
The City of Minot received a request for recording, transcripts, and notes from any interviews done by the Center for Mediation and Consultation during the 2020 personnel investigation done for the city. The city did not have transcripts or recordings of interviews, and declined to provide the interview notes, claiming they were exempt as attorney work product because they were created by an attorney who was hired to conduct an independent investigation. The fact that an attorney made the notes does not automatically mean the elements of attorney work product are met. The public entity must still make an analysis of the records to determine whether there are any statutory protections. The City of Minot violated the open records law when it denied a request for records as attorney work product. The city must review the notes, may redact any that have statutory protections, and must release the remaining notes to the requester.
Read the opinion at: https://attorneygeneral.nd.gov/sites/ag/files/documents/Opinions/2021/OR-OM/2021-O-05.pdf