… All Final Audit Reports…Are … Open Records

This time of year, the Missouri legislature and its actions distract me from the matters at hand
on this blog. But violations and interesting twists of the law go on.

A reader points out to me a recent vote taken by a city council in the state that was weighing a
proposal to have a court reporter transcribe the discussion in closed session between council
members and a member of the state auditor’s office over the results of a recent audit (huh?).
(Citizens had complained they didn’t trust the clerk to keep proper minutes and thus the proposal
to get a court reporter in for this duty.)

But the problem is the body seems to have forgotten that you cannot discuss in a closed
meeting ANYTHING except the subject which properly caused the closed meeting to be held.
Voting on who takes minutes in a closed session is, first, NOT a subject for a closed meeting and
it does NOT fit under the exception contained in Section 610.021 (17). This is NOT
confidential or privileged communication between a public governmental body and its
auditor…. This is a vote about who is allowed into a closed meeting, and the process for
holding the closed meeting. Doing this in closed session is a violation of the sunshine law. Can
you say Illegal action ? Can you say fine and/or attorneys fees ? No, probably not. I mean,
citizens can, but we can’t seem to make ourselves heard by judges in the state.

All these folks get copies of the Attorney General’s sunshine law booklet. But do they ever
read it? How can we get these folks to read the law? If they would read it, perhaps there would
be fewer violations. If they would be fined and assessed attorney fees, perhaps there would be
fewer violations.

Such acts are just inexcusable.

Incidentally, the city attorney’s office in Kansas City issued a fascinating decision last week
that I want to think about and, in coming weeks, explore. It determined that the preliminary
document constituting the auditor’s preliminary final report was a final audit report and was
open to the public. It concluded that the only thing closed were documents prepared in the
process of the audit which constituted auditor work product — notes and such. Indeed, this
department is correct. The exception talks about ALL (emphasis added) audit reports … are to
be considered open records….

This is going to open some eyes around the state. It was a wonderful analysis. I haven’t even
begun to exploit it, and I can’t wait