OKTIBBEHA COUNTY — Oktibbeha County is claiming it did not violate the state Open Meetings Act when it held multiple non-quorum meetings with engineers earlier this month to discuss potential improvements to the Oktibbeha County Lake dam.
The Dispatch filed an Open Meetings complaint against the county after supervisors met with representatives of Mississippi Engineering Group on Feb. 3 in separate non-quorum discussions that were not noticed or open to public attendance.
Supervisors Orlando Trainer and Joe Williams attended one session, while board president Bricklee Miller and Supervisor Marvell Howard attended the other. Supervisor John Montgomery was out of town and attended neither meeting.
The Dispatch was invited to attend the meetings, and a reporter did sit in the session with Miller and Howard. However, since the meetings weren’t open to the public, the newspaper alleges they constituted “rolling quorums,” which the Ethics Commission has previously deemed a violation of the Open Meetings Act.
In the county’s response to the complaint, board of supervisors attorney Rob Roberson wrote these meetings were informal “educational meetings” meant to answer questions for supervisors about a complicated topic. The response claims supervisors did not discuss policy, funding or any type of action but simply to better prepare supervisors to discuss the dam report in a public session in March.
They weren’t rolling quorums, he wrote, because they weren’t pre-arranged meetings where the “deliberative stages of the decision-making process that lead to the formation and determination of public policy” took place.
The Dispatch filed a similar complaint — Gregory v. The City of Columbus, 2014 — against Columbus after the city council met in non-quorum shifts on multiple occasions to discuss issues related to economic development and Trotter Convention Center. The Ethics Commission ruled the city was in violation, a decision upheld by the state Supreme Court.
Roberson, in his response, wrote this case is unlike the Gregory case because decisions weren’t made and the media was welcome to attend.
“Due to the fact these meetings did not violate the Open Meetings Act and that the media themselves were invited then this matter should be dismissed with prejudice and the Oktibbeha County Board of Supervisors should be found not violated of the Mississippi Open Meetings act,” the response reads.
The Dispatch stands by its claim the meetings should have been open to the public.
“While we don’t believe these meetings were intended to be secretive in any way, we stand by our position that the information presented was intended to help lawmakers make an informed decision. Such meetings — regardless of the complexity of the subject matter — should be open to the public,” said Dispatch publisher Peter Imes.
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Quality, in-depth journalism is essential to a healthy community. The Dispatch brings you the most complete reporting and insightful commentary in the Golden Triangle, but we need your help to continue our efforts. In the past week, our reporters have posted 35 articles to cdispatch.com. Please consider subscribing to our website for only $2.30 per week to help support local journalism and our community.
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