Suzy and The Sunshine Law

Sit down children. Miss Jackson's lesson today covers the basics of Missouri Sunshine Law. It has been reported that some of you have major misunderstandings of how this law actually works. I hope you haven’t been listening to those ORTians who will completely and intentionally mislead you.

RSMO Section 610 is the pertinent section of Missiour State Statutes that covers these laws. It encompasses more than open meetings, which has been the subject of recent lawsuits, but also other governmental information and records. The point behind the law is that it is your government and you have the right and privilege to know just about everything on how your government operates.
The law sets out the specific instances when a meeting, record or vote may be closed. It also stipulates that when in doubt, these sections of the law should be “liberally construed and their exceptions strictly construed to promote this public policy” (Section 610.011)

Class, here are the most important issues you should know about Missouri’s Sunshine Law:

1. When in doubt, a meeting or record of a public body should be opened to the public.
2. The Sunshine Law applies to all records, regardless of what form they are kept in, and to all meetings, regardless of the manner in which they are held.
3. The Sunshine Law allows a public body to close meetings and records to the public in some limited circumstances, but it almost never requires a public body to do so.
4. A public body generally must give at least 24 hours' public notice before holding a meeting. If the meeting will be closed to the public, the notice must state the specific provision of the law that allows the meeting to be closed.
5. Each public body must have a written Sunshine Law policy and a custodian of records whose name is available to the public upon request.
6. The Sunshine Law requires a custodian of records to respond to a records request as soon as possible but no later than three business days after the custodian receives it.
7. The Sunshine Law deals with whether a public body's records must be open to the public, but it generally does not state what records the body must keep or for how long. A body cannot, however, avoid a records request by destroying records after it receives a request for those records.
8. The Sunshine Law requires a public body to grant access to open records it already has, but it does not require a public body to create new records in response to a request for information.
9. When responding to a request for copies of its records, the Sunshine Law limits how much a public body can charge for copying and research costs.
10. There are special laws and rules that govern access to law enforcement and judicial records.

Does the class have any questions?

What’s that Mikey? You say Courtney told you that there was a violation of Sunshine Law by revealing information? Well, Mikey, such foolish statements go against the nature of the Sunshine Law. Basically it is “Sun Shine” as in letting the light flow over governmental proceedings. It is about open government, not about closed meetings. In addition, nowhere in the open meetings law does it provide for any penalty that may be assessed against a member of a public body for disclosing closed meeting infomation. Thus, it is never a violation to release information, just to withhold information.

Yes, Cindy? What about the police officers? Well, that suit was public information and even on broadcast news before I brought it up before the class. Thus, it is not even a privacy violation since court records are public. In addition, employee information such as rank, salary, and dates of employment are also public information.

Okay, one last question. Tommy? What is that? You heard about a lunch meeting between the budget committee, the mayor and a trash company that was not reported as a regular meeting? Yes, Tommy, that is covered under the Sunshine Law. A public meeting is any meeting of a public governmental body where public business is discussed, decided or public policy is formulated (Section 610.010(5). Public business is defined in Section 610.010(3) as all matters that relate in any way to the performance of the public governmental body's functions or the conduct of its business.
A court case related to this matter is The Kansas City Star v. Shields, 771 S.W.2d 101 (Mo. App. W.D. 1989). That case was about how the chairman and two members of the City Council Finance Committee of Kansas City, the city manager and the city budget director held a luncheon meeting without notice in a private dining room of a Kansas City restaurant. The following day, the committee unanimously adopted a budget agreement. This meeting, where public business was discussed, constituted a public meeting and notice should have been posted (See Attorney General's Opinion No. 10-75.) and recordings of these proceedings should be made available to the public.


Today’s assignments:
1. Read the following blog and find references to cases that are similar to issues in Overland. This is a wonderful blog from a KC lawyer who deals with Sunshine issues in the state of Missouri

2. Think about public governmental information that you would like access. Tomorrow we will start to finalize our own FOIA requests. Please begin a rough draft. You will find necessary guidelines here.


Important links for follow-up and sources of information for this lesson:
The Attorney General’s Open Government Page
The Attorney General’s Sunshine Law Page

Remember our class motto: A well-educated citizen is our best citizen.