March 12, 2009
By ROBERTA FUGATE
VERNON -- A week after a Superior Court judge instructed Vernon Township to comply with state law regarding executive session minutes, council members tonight will introduce an ordinance that will do just that.
The ruling by Judge Theodore Bozonelis was in response to a lawsuit filed by Sparta resident Jesse Wolosky, who said his open records request for council minutes from August through November was not fulfilled following the delayed release of a redacted set of minutes spanning January 2003 through August 2008, which had been requested by Vernon resident Jessi Paladini.
"I'm happy with the results," Wolosky said. "It's a victory for the residents of Vernon. From now on this will be the procedure."
In court, Bozonelis said the council had not been in compliance with open meeting and records laws in response to Wolosky's request for August through November 2008 minutes, and must pass the proposed ordinance within 60 days.
The ordinance states that the township clerk will attend all executive session meetings of the Vernon Township Council and prepare a confidential set of draft minutes for each session, with redactions as appropriate, for approval by the council at the next regularly scheduled council meeting.
Once approved for release to the public, the executive session minutes will be available on the following business day.
According to the state Open Public Meetings Act, a public body must keep minutes of its meeting "showing the time and place, the members present, the subjects considered, the actions taken, the vote of each member, and any other information required to be shown in the minutes by law..." and promptly make them available to the public.
"We were actually on our way to doing it (complying with the open meetings law), said Vernon Mayor Austin Carew. "Myself and the rest of the council have been trying to limit executive sessions and to release the minutes. We don't have anything to hide."
"I was the public once and plan to be the public again," Carew added. "I don't have a problem with anyone wanting the minutes. I think it benefits the people, the council and the towns to have them released."
Vernon resident Jessi Paladini said there has been a lot of misinformation about the lawsuit. "It wasn't just the situation of the minutes for five or 10 years of executive session meetings, it was the wholesale redaction of things -- and discussing what they (the council) shouldn't have been discussing in executive session."
The judge agreed, Paladini said. "If the lawsuit got us in the right direction it was a positive thing."
According to the ordinance, the township clerk also will be required to maintain a privilege/redaction log describing the general topic discussed, the date on which the topic was discussed and the reason for the redaction.
If the council determines the legitimate reason for confidentiality no longer exists regarding a particular executive session discussion, the township clerk will make the previously redacted minutes available to the public in unredacted form on the following business day.
"I don't see the passing of this ordinance as something we weren't going to do -- it's definitely a step in the right direction," said Carew.
