I. PURPOSE
The purpose of this policy is to establish procedures relating to the maintenance of records of the School Board and the publication of its official proceedings.
II. GENERAL STATEMENT
It is the policy of the school district to maintain its records so that they will be available for inspection by members of the general public and to provide for the publication of its official proceedings in compliance with law.
III. MAINTENANCE OF MINUTES AND RECORDS
A. The Clerk shall keep and maintain permanent records of the School Board, including records of the minutes of School Board meetings and other required records of the School Board. All votes taken at meetings required to be open to the public pursuant to the Minnesota Open Meeting Law shall be recorded and maintained on file in the Superintendent's office and available for inspection by members of the public during regular business hours of the school district. Minutes of meetings shall be available for inspection at the administrative offices of the school district after they have been prepared. Minutes of a School Board meeting shall be approved or modified by the School Board at a subsequent meeting, which action shall be reflected in the official proceedings of that subsequent meeting.
B. Recordings of Closed Meetings
1. All closed meetings, except those closed as permitted by the attorney-client privilege, must be electronically recorded at the expense of the school district. Recordings of closed meetings shall be made separately from the recordings of an open meeting, to the extent such meetings are recorded. If a meeting is closed to discuss more than one (1) matter, each matter should be separately recorded.
2. Recordings of closed meetings shall be preserved by the school district for the following time periods:
a. Meetings closed to discuss labor negotiations strategy shall be preserved for two (2) years after all contracts in the cycle are signed.
b. Meetings closed to discuss security matters shall be preserved for at least four (4) years.
c. Meetings closed to discuss the purchase or sale of property shall be preserved for at least eight (8) years after the date of the meeting.
d. All other closed meetings shall be preserved by the school district for at least three (3) years after the date of the meeting.
e. Following the expiration of the above time periods, recordings of closed meetings shall be maintained as set forth in the school district's Records Retention Schedule.
3. Recordings of closed meetings shall be classified by the school district as protected non-public data that is not accessible by the public or as governed by applicable law, with the following exceptions:
a. Recordings of labor negotiations strategy meetings shall be classified as public data and made available to the public after all labor contracts are signed by the school district for the current budget period.
b. Recordings of meetings related to the purchase or sale of property shall be classified as public data and made available to the public after all real or personal property discussed at the meeting has been purchased or sold or the school district has abandoned the purchase or sale.
c. Recordings of any other closed meetings shall be classified and/or released as required by court order.
4. Recordings of closed meetings shall be maintained separately from recordings of open meetings to the extent recordings of open meetings are maintained by the school district, with the exception of recordings that have been classified as public data as set forth in Section III.B.3 above. Recordings of closed meetings classified as non-public data also shall be maintained in a secure location, separate from recordings classified as public data.
5. Recordings of closed meetings shall be maintained in a manner to easily identify the data classification of the recording. The recordings shall be identified with at least the following information:
a. The date of the closed meeting;
b. The basis upon which the meeting was closed (i.e.: labor negotiations strategy, purchase or sale of property, educational data, etc.); and
c. The classification of the data.
6. Recordings of closed meetings related to labor negotiations strategy and the purchase or sale of property shall be maintained and monitored in a manner that reclassifies the recording as public upon the occurrence of an event reclassifying that data as set forth in Section III.B.3 above.
IV. PUBLICATION OF OFFICIAL PROCEEDINGS
A. The School Board shall cause its official proceedings to be published once in the official newspaper of the school district within thirty (30) days of the meeting at which the proceeding occurred; however, if the school board conducts regular meetings not more than once every thirty (30) days, the school board need not publish the minutes until ten (10) days after they have been approved by the School Board.
B. The proceedings to be published shall be sufficiently full to fairly set forth the proceedings. They must include the date, time, place, type of meeting, and names of School Board members in attendance. It will include the substance of all official actions taken by the School Board at any regular or special meeting, and at minimum must include the subject matter of a motion, the persons making and seconding the motion, a listing of how each member present voted on the motion, the character of resolutions offered including a brief description of their subject matter and whether adopted or defeated. The minutes and permanent records of the School Board may include more detail than is required to be published with the official proceedings. If the proceedings have not yet been approved by the School Board, the proceedings to be published will reflect that fact.
C. The proceedings to be published may be a summary of the essential elements of the proceedings, and/or of resolutions and other official actions of the School Board. Such a summary shall be written in a clear and coherent manner and shall, to the extent possible, avoid the use of technical or legal terms not generally familiar to the public. When a summary is published, the publication shall clearly indicate that the published material is only a summary; the full text is available for public inspection at the administrative offices of the school district and that a copy of the proceedings, other than attachments to the minutes, is available without cost at the offices of the school district or by means of standard or electronic mail.
Legal References:
Minn. Stat. 123B.09 Subd.10 (Boards of Independent School Districts)
Minn. Stat. 123B.14, Subd. 7 (Officers of Independent School Districts)
Minn. Stat. 331A.01 (Definition)
Minn. Stat. 331A.05, Subd. 8 (Form of Public Notice)
Minn. Stat. 331A.08, Subd. 3 (Publication of Proceedings)
Minn. Stat. 13D.01, Subds. 4-6 (Open Meeting Law)
Op. Atty. Gen 161-a-20, December 17, 1970
Ketterer v. Independent School District No. 1, 248 Minn. 212, 79 N.W. 2d 428 (1956)
Cross References:
Moorhead School Board Policy 205 Open and Closed Meetings
MSBA/MASA Model Policy 204: School Board Meeting Minutes
MSBA/MASA Model Policy 205: Open and Closed Meetings
MSBA Service Manual, chapter 1, School district Governance, Powers and Duties