One of the things that we believe is important for the everyone is that meetings of public bodies are held in the open. It’s not just for us to try and report on the actions happening in the meetings, but for everyone.
This year, we have two bills introduced in both houses that we hope that our local representatives will support.
The first is one that is making its way through the House with a copy in the Senate. It is House Bill 633 with the companion bill Senate Bill 2204.
If a public body has violated any provisions of the Open Meetings Act, a court may void any action taken “if the court determines that the public interest in voiding the action taken outweighs the public interest of sustaining the action itself.”
However, whoever seeks to invalidate the action bring a lawsuit asking for the enforcement of invalidating the action.
The only one caveat is that the action cannot void the issuance of bonds or other evidence of indebtedness of a public body “if a public hearing, election or public sale has been held regarding the bonds or evidence of indebtedness.”
This bill is much needed to show that we want transparency by our public servants.
The second one is Senate Bill 2667, which corrects an error that was made by the Ethics Commission last year. The Commission decided last year that the Open Meetings Act did not apply to meetings of legislative delegations where there were more than a majority of representatives attending.
It was a peculiar ruling, but Senate Bill 2667 would add a few words to the Mississippi Code to change that. The Ethics Commission’s decision came in a case where a reporter for the Mississippi Free Press was not allowed to attend a meeting of the House Republican Caucus. The reporter contended that since a majority of House members would be there, it constituted a quorum. And since legislative business would be discussed, the meeting should have been open to the public.
House Speaker Philip Gunn contended the Open Meetings Act does not specifically apply to the Legislature, and a majority of the Ethics Commission basically agreed with that assessment. But it makes no sense to hold virtually every other public board in Mississippi to a high standard of openness, while having a lower standard for the public officials with the most power and influence in the state.
The Senate bill would solve this problem by specifically identifying the Legislature as a public body that is covered by the Open Meetings Act. The bill deserves strong consideration, but may run into resistance from some Republicans, who hold a majority of the seats in both the House and Senate, and thus would be affected.
It also increases the penalty from $100 to $500 for the offense.
We are happy to see that Sen. Tyler McCaughn has already signed on to this bill and are hopeful this will be passed this session. The Legislature should be subject to the same rules as our Board of Supervisors, school district board of trustees and boards of aldermen.
We would also hope that McCaughn and Reps. Randy Rushing and Troy Smith, along with Reps. Steve Horne and Billy Adam Calvert whose areas were redistricted to include Newton County, will also support both of these important bills.
