Who’s meeting? What are they talking about? And where can you get more information? I wish there was a simple explanation. However, like much of life, the more you ask, the deeper you go, the more complicated it gets. And when it comes to government, that’s not good. We should be striving to be transparent and easily understandable. And we should be doing everything we can to make it easier for the public to interact with us.
Clerk’s Weekly Meeting Schedule
The City Clerk’s website is updated every Sunday to post meetings for the week ahead. They have a summary of what group is meeting, the date and time of their meeting and where they will be meeting. It’s a handy reference when you’re running out the door and forgot which room your meeting is in, but it doesn’t tell you what the agendas for the meetings will be. And, even if a meeting is on this list, it IS NOT legally posted. It is likely that it is legally posted, but mistakes happen, there are computer glitches and life happens. Even more likely, as I discovered yesterday, a meeting may not appear on the list and yet it might be legally posted. So, if this isn’t the list of legally posted meetings, where is it?
Legistar
So, if you know there is a meeting and want to find the agenda, where do you look? The easiest place, which isn’t obviously linked from the Weekly Meeting Schedule is to look in “Legistar”. It’s linked in the list on the right and called “On Line City Hall.” For the past two years we have a new software program that helps to track legislation. This tracking program has a list of meetings, the date, time and place of the meeting AND it adds the agenda and eventually the minutes. Then, theoretically, when you click on the agenda, it provides further links to the actual legislation that is being voted on. And, theoretically, it also attaches the additional information that is handed out to the committee to help them make decisions. It’s a powerful tool for the public and alders when it is used properly. However, even if a meeting appears on this list in legistar, it IS NOT legally noticed. It’s true, that it likely isn’t legally noticed unless an agenda has been created in legistar. However, not all committees use legistar and some people create agendas in other formats. So, if this isn’t the list of legally posted meetings, where is it?
List of Additional Meetings
This is where they put agendas and minutes for committees that don’t use legistar. Usually these are ad hoc committees, subcommittees or one time meetings that need to be publicly noticed. Usually. But again, even if a meeting appears on this list, it IS NOT legally noticed. So, if this isn’t where you can find legally noticed meetings, where is it?
Other postings of meeting dates and agendas
Some committees post additional calendars of when their meetings are going to be. I’m most familiar with the Plan Commission, Urban Design Commission and Landmarks schedules that are posted for developers. I’m sure you can find other committees who have also posted their meeting dates and times in a schedule, but this, too, IS NOT where you can find legally noticed meetings.
Additionally, if you look at the City Committee website that explains who is on committees, what their mission is, who staff’s the meetings and posts some agendas and minutes, you may also find a list of dates of meetings and the description of the committee with probably say when the committee typically meets, but this, too, IS NOT where you can find legally posted meetings. So, where is it?
Legally Posted Meetings – A meeting is legally posted when the City Clerk posts the agenda in the appropriate designated area for the meeting 24 hours before the meeting is scheduled to begin. If this doesn’t happen, the members of the public body are the ones that could get fined for holding an illegal meeting. And lately, there have been more than one illegal meeting. So, the million dollar question for all of you this morning is, where is this designated posting place? Do you know? Would you even ever look there? Or would you choose one of the on-line versions? If you find the legal postings of meetings, let me know! I had to call and ask where they were physically posted and when I was told, I had recalled seeing them there when I was in that spot for a completely unrelated purpose, but they are not in an obvious or sometimes even accessible (i.e. locked) place! In fact, I wonder how many of the 20 alders or members of the Mayor’s staff even know the answer? And what about the hundreds of committee members we have?
