GRAND BLANC TWP, MI - Grand Blanc Township Supervisor Scott Bennett has warned township board members that a recent email exchanges among them violated the Open Meetings Act.
In multiple emails in the days leading to an in-person board meeting scheduled for July 1, trustees said they would not attend the meeting due to current state guidelines to prevent the spread of COVID-19.
The meeting, scheduled to discuss township management after the termination of Superintendent Dennis Liimatta, lacked a quorum, with five of seven Grand Blanc Township trustees absent.
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Bennett, Clerk Cathy Lane, Treasurer Earl Guzak, Lonnie Adkins, Al Mansour and Joe Massey responded to the emails discussing the decision to hold a meeting in person. The only trustee who did not respond to the emails was Ken Thomas.
After several email exchanges, Bennett said in the email chain: “I believe this Board discussion via email is another violation of the Open Meetings Act.”
The Open Meetings Act handbook states, “the use of electronic communications for discussions or deliberations, which are not, at a minimum, able to be heard by the public in attendance at an open meeting are contrary to the OMA’s core purpose – the promotion of openness in government.”
Using e-mail to distribute handouts, agenda items, statistical information, or other such material during an open meeting should be permissible under the OMA, particularly when copies of that information are also made available to the public before or during the meeting.
“You can email out to the board, but they can’t all respond,” Bennett said Wednesday, July 8.
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Michael Selden, director of member information for the Michigan Townships Association, said he can’t say if the exchange was a violation of the Open Meetings Act as he is not an attorney, however, the MTA generally discourages board member from using the “reply all” function in an email chain.
“Generally speaking, I would say, if a quorum of a public body is discussing township business outside of an open meeting, then it would be a violation,” Seldon said. “So then the question comes down to okay then was this township business? If I’m just saying, hey, I’m not attending a meeting, or I don’t want to attend a meeting and I text everybody - that by itself isn’t a violation. But if you get people starting to respond back to that and there’s a quorum or more on that, then you’ve got deliberation, which would be a violation. Then the question comes: talking about attending a meeting, is that township business?”
The July 1 meeting was originally scheduled to be held indoors. However, after board members expressed that this could violate the current executive order in regard to holding public gatherings, Bennett moved the meeting to Bicentennial Park North Pavilion.
Board members still said they would not attend, citing health concerns.
“There is no reason to put the Board or the public at risk and expose them to COVID-19,” Lane said in one of the emails.
Under the current executive order for Michigan’s Region Four, indoor social gatherings and events among persons not part of a single household are permitted, but may not exceed 10 people. Outdoor events may not exceed 50 people in attendance and there must be room for social distancing.
In the case of holding an in person meeting under the current COVID-19 rules, even outdoors, the MTA often encourages an online means to attend the meeting, Seldon said.
“While the law doesn’t specifically require or say that you have to provide a digital means for attending a meeting, you really can’t turn people away from attending a public meeting so, if you were to reach capacity, then you would really need to stop holding the meeting and shut it down because you can’t turn people away and if you aren’t providing some other means for them to attend, you wouldn’t be able to continue meeting,” he said.
This is not the first time the board has been warned of a potential violation of the Open Meetings Act.
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The board voted to terminate Superintendent Dennis Liimatta’s contract without cause Tuesday, June 23. The action was not an agenda item for the meeting but passed 5-2. Bennett and Guzak cast the dissenting votes.
While the board could not hold a meeting Wednesday, July 1, Bennett allowed public comment.
Larry Anderson , a former board member, participated in comment at the meeting.
“Never should you add an agenda item and just drop it on the table in the middle of a meeting like they did with their $4,000 pay bonus and like they did with the firing of Mr. Liimatta,” Anderson said. “That is a terrible, unethical thing to do. I would also like to mention that the four people, in one case five of those board members, sat there after that motion was made, stone faced, motionless, like they completely and totally expected that to be coming when we had no idea it was going to happen. Well if three board members get together and discuss a topic before a meeting, that is a breach of the Open Meetings Act. That is against the law.”
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