Bad Advice

The special meeting of the DeKalb Public Library Board was convened without a roll call to determine which board members were present. There may or may not have been a quorum. The agenda for the meeting was posted on the library’s website but it was not discussed or approved. The board president wasn’t in attendance. He didn’t need to be because the meeting wasn’t called to order.

But Phil Lenzini, an attorney, led the library board through a work shop on the Open Meetings Act.

Lenzini cited many stories. One community in downstate Illinois decided to release some closed session minutes regarding the hiring of their city manager. The press actually read the minutes and reported that the city commissioners had violated the Open Meetings Act by voting to give the city manager a raise in closed session. The public got upset. The commissioners got bad press.

“Which was the bigger sin,” asked Lenzini. “Violating the Open Meetings Act as it was clear the commissioners did? Or, releasing the closed session minutes?”

Lenzini recommends that his clients never release closed session minutes because he sees no reward for doing so. There’s only, as he sees it in the example above, a risk for getting caught.

This is Illinois.

Lenzini explained what he thought final action was relative to real estate. It’s the closing. That’s final action. So then within the parameters of the Open Meetings Act, which he was paid to teach the library board about, the public session vote shouldn’t have to take place until the closing date.

After the meeting Lenzini answered some questions from Bill Feldman. And he told some stories. Cara Smith, the current Public Access Counselor for the Illinois Attorney General, is more of a politician than she is a lawyer. Smith’s predecessor, according to Lenzini, was a former Clinton intern. She even had a blue dress.

You get what you paid for.