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Tuscola Commissioners review options on private committee meetings
Mary Drier/Mike Kaufman
Tue, 23 Jul 2024 21:31:30 EDT
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Tuscola County Commissioners talked about transparency at Monday's meeting, but did nothing to make that happen regarding committee meetings.
The issue of having all meetings available for the public to attend or to view was brought up at previous meetings by Commissioner Thom Bardwell from an article in the Michigan Association of Counties (MAC) newsletter regarding committee meetings to be held in accordance with Michigan's Open Meetings Act (OMA).
Bardwell said again at Monday's meeting he believes fellow commissioners are violating the OMA. At that point, commissioners started to look at alternative ways to skirt the OMA. Commissioners talked about only having one person be a committee to do an individual meeting, and to have an assigned alternative member as a back up. Discussions of finding an alternative way to do a committee meeting out of the public purview was talked about in the same breath as having transparency of country government where all meetings are done in public.
During discussion, it was pointed out the county didn't have to offer video of any meetings, and video only came about as a result of the COVID pandemic.
Some commissioners supported the one person committee as a way to sidestep OMA regulations, and agreed to have a legal review of that proposed option.
Tuscola County Clerk Jodi Fetting said before she believes commissioners were violating the OMA issue with committee meetings. The concerns of Bardwell and Fetting were not addressed by the board.
Previously, committee meetings were posted in advance, minutes of the committee meetings taken and kept by the county clerk's office. Also, they were available on a video feed, but that changed recently. In May 2019, commissioners adopted a resolution that all committee meetings be held in compliance with the OMA. Then in 2023, commissioners rescinded that resolution which nullified committee meetings to be conducted in public meeting with minutes taken. The OMA explains how meetings should be conducted, and has a provision for fines when it is violated.
