WE THE PEOPLE......DO YOU COPY????

The problem mentioned before with the Open Meeting Law and required public copies of what the Board (or Planning Commission) is discussing at meetings continues.

Under the Open Meeting Law (OML), the Township MUST provide at least one copy for the public of anything printed that the Board has before it and is considering and discussing in a public meeting. This is true except for what the Data Practices Act classifies as other than public. The public has the right to follow the discussion fully and observe the decisions being made. This is what the OML is all about!

Sadly, this has been spotty at best. I have, for a number of consecutive meetings, asked the Chair if there were a public copy of something the Board had before it. In these instances, if I haven't asked for a copy of a document not in the public folder, the public hasn't received it. At the June Board meeting, there were no public copies of (1) the draft airport annexation agreement (important?), (2) the draft language for a resolution affecting parking (especially targeting offending semis) on Township roads, and (3) the materials that will be presented at the upcoming but as yet unscheduled Open House on Commercial/Industrial (C/I) use.

On this last item, you may recall that the "work group" for this consideration of C/I has repeatedly resisted that they should be providing public copies of their materials at their meetings. The Board still has not acknowledged that, although the "work group" is not a quorum of either the Board or the Commission, it IS a quorum of the "work group" appointed by the Board! This makes it a Special Committee under the Ordinances as referenced before on this blogsite. If certain "work group" members such as Hansen, who has been the most publicly vocal about it, cannot see the distinction, I believe the Board should step up and point it out and require conformance with the OML. So far they haven't done that.

Once I received the C/I Open House materials at the June meeting, I still had to ask whether the Township would put this information on its website so that citizens can read it ahead of time and be prepared for the Open House. Chair Palmquist assured those assembled that it would be. I'm left wondering (not really) why the Board members of this "work group" present at this Board meeting (Ceminsky and Hansen) didn't make sure of this website posting themselves!

It reminded me of the time in December/January that the Board received a letter from the TKDA planner in which she presented views/advice contrary to what the C/I "work group" wanted and thought it was getting. When this letter was raised at a Board meeting at the time, Butch Hansen stated that "You (the Board) weren't supposed to see that." Supervisor Barfknecht replied that that was nonsense; of course the Board should see it!  I guess the public wasn't supposed to see it either as again I had to ask for a copy. This December letter was later followed by a January letter in which the planner basically changed the stance to go along with what the "work group" was pushing for. I don't recall exactly, but I'm pretty sure there was no copy of this subsequent letter from the planner either. Do you need a reminder of Hansen's later comments at a "work group" meeting that "She (the planner) screwed it up again" and "She has to go back to the drawing board." I have never heard this C/I group ask the planner for her rationale for the advice she gave. Maybe that doesn't matter to them.

Similarly, you may recall that in the past, during a meeting, Hansen pulled out 5 copies (instead of the 7 as required to provide copies for the public and the attorney) of a resolution saying something along the lines of, "I knew it wouldn't be/didn't think it would be in the packets." (Disc back-up.) This deprived the Board of reading it ahead of time and the public of following along.

At the May Board meeting, Ceminsky handed out 5 copies (not 7) of his "road report" to the Board in which he stated that the Township would need to spend $1,254,000 to pay just for the "gravel overlay our roads need." Since this would have such an impact on the public, why wouldn't a public copy have been provided? Stunning. More on that in another blog to come.


I sincerely hope the Board will raise this issue of OML public copies at its next meeting so the Township can be in compliance with state law.