Recording in progress.

So what is the open and public meetings act?

It's the state law that ensures government actions and deliberations are openly conducted.

Before we continue, keep in mind that this video is an overview, and exceptions may exist based on your entity type.

When in doubt, read the law and consult with your legal counsel.

So what's considered an open and public meeting?

Open and public meetings don't include chance or social meetings.

Public hearings happen when a government adopts a budget, imposes or increases taxes or fees, or transfers money from an enterprise fund.

These meetings have extra notice and posting requirements and won't be addressed in this video.

An electronic meeting is a type of open and public meeting that's convened electronically, such as via phone or the internet.

Remember, the governing body must adopt a resolution, rule, or ordinance allowing and governing electronic meetings.

OTMA adds additional requirements too.

An emergency meeting may be held to discuss an urgent matter due to unforeseen circumstances.

In order to hold the meeting, the best notice that's feasible is provided of the time, location, and topics to be considered.

An attempt is made to contact all governing body members, and a governing body majority approves the meeting.

An open and public meeting may be closed to discuss any of the following: a person's character, competence, or health, collective bargaining, litigation, certain real property transactions, including any form of a water right or water shares with specific restrictions, security personnel, devices or systems deployment, investigations of criminal misconduct, and private or protected information for the Utah Procurement Code, including trade secrets.

A closed meeting may be held only if a quorum is present and the meeting was properly noticed.

Two-thirds of the governing body present at the meeting need to vote yes to close a meeting.

Quick math lesson.

Two divided by three equals 66.7%.

Let's say your governing body has five members present at the meeting.

If three out of five members vote yes, that equals 60%, which is not equal or greater than 66.7%, which means you are one member short and would need four out of five members to vote yes.

During a closed meeting, a governing body can't interview someone applying to fill an elected position, discuss filling a midterm vacancy or temporary absence, discuss the character, competence, or health of a person whose name was submitted for consideration to fill of midterm vacancy or temporary absence, approve any ordinance, resolution, rule, regulation, contract, or appointment, or take a vote, unless it's a vote on a motion to end the closed portion of the meeting and return to an open meeting.

When a governing body closes a meeting, the following must be publicly announced and entered into the minutes of the open meeting at which the closed meeting was approved.

The reason or reasons for holding the closed meeting, the location where the closed meeting will be held, and the vote of each member of the governing body either for or against the motion to close the meeting.

If a closed meeting is discussing a person's character, competence or health, or security personnel, devices or systems deployment, or several other exceptions, mostly related to state bodies or project entities, no recording or minutes are required.

However, the presiding member needs to sign a sworn written statement stating such.

If the closed meeting is held for any other reason, the recording must be made, which includes date, time and place of the meeting, names of members present and absent, and names of all others, except where disclosure would infringe on the confidentiality necessary to fulfill the original purpose of closing the meeting.

Regular open and public meetings require 24 hours notice.

The public notice includes the meeting, agenda, date, time, and place.

Public meeting agendas need to include reasonably specified topics to be considered, with each topic listed under a separate agenda item on the meeting agenda.

The governing body may not consider a topic in an open meeting that wasn't on the agenda.

If a new topic not on the agenda is raised by the public during an open meeting, the governing body may discuss the topic.

However, final action may not be taken on the new topic during that meeting.

Additionally, entities holding regular meetings scheduled in advance over the course of the year need to provide annual notice of the entire year's meeting schedule.

The notice must include date, time, and place for each meeting.

Notice is posted on the public body's website in a public location, such as the location where the meeting will be held, and on Utah's public notice website in accordance with Utah Code 63G-30-102.

Typically, posting on the public notice website is done by the records officer, recorder, or clerk.

However, it's the governing body's responsibility to ensure notice is provided.

State Archives has prepared a training manual and quick guide for owners and posters, as well as training videos that can be accessed at their website, archives.gov.

Written minutes and a recording are kept of all open meetings, with few exceptions.

Written minutes include the date, time and place of the meeting, the names of members present and absent, the substance of all matters, names of citizens providing comments, the substance of the comments provided, any information a body member requests be entered into the minutes or recording, and a record by individual member of each vote taken.

A body with elected members must record each vote in list format by category for each action taken by a member, including yes votes, no votes, and absent members next to each member's name.

Approved minutes means written minutes of an open meeting approved by the public body that helped open meeting.

My problem is I wasn't going to do any of our reports.

So uh you're well have Sharon recessed.

Yeah.

Yeah, dude.

Uh yeah.

Yeah.

Well the internet.

Recording stopped.

Can we do that when it's our nine five?

But everyone has to be unanimous.

Yeah, yeah, forwards.

Which is a problem.

Okay, welcome to tonight's meeting for the Sandy City Planning Commission.

We'll do a quick round of introductions and pledge, and then we'll get into our business.

My name is Danny Schoenfeld, and we'll do a quick inter intro for the Planning Commission and then staff.

Jennifer George.