Duty to Make Meetings Convenient and Open to the Public
This binding opinion from the Illinois Attorney General’s Public Access Counselor (PAC) discusses an issue under the Open Meetings Act (OMA) of whether there was a violation by the Village of Dolton (Village) Board of Trustees (Board) of the duty to make meetings convenient and open to the public. Multiple requests for review were filed with the Board claiming that many people were turned away from Board meetings recently because of limited seating capacity, parking blockades inhibiting seniors and people with disabilities from accessing the building, and the alleged fostering of a hostile meeting environment.
OMA provides that all public meetings shall be held at specified times and places convenient and open to the public. 5 ILCS 120/2.01. Further, OMA requires public bodies to take measures to ensure that they afford the public reasonable access to their meetings. Id. OMA has been interpreted to require “reasonable accessibility” such that a Board is required to implement measures to better accommodate the public when given advance notice of increased attendance for an upcoming meeting, while at the same time not requiring a Board to go to such lengths as to ensure that every single person who wishes to attend a Board meeting is able to attend in full comfort. Gerwin v. Livingston Cnty. Bd., 345 Ill. App. 3d 352, 361-62 (2003).
Here, the Board had advance notice that the location and set-up of the June 3, 2024 and July 1, 2024 meetings were insufficient to accommodate increasing numbers of interested members of the public. The Board made no adjustments to provide reasonable access to the meetings in question, and many of the members of the public were prohibited from entering the meeting space at the Village Hall. The Board added restrictions of parking barricades in the parking lot, including blocking spots designated for people with disabilities and surrounding street parking spots, all of which impeded public access to the meetings.
The Board responded in part to the PAC by providing a statement from the Acting Chief of Police indicating safety measures were put in place to prevent potential perpetrators of wrongdoing and ill-will toward the Mayor from having access to her. The Fire Chief provided a letter indicating that an assigned seating area with the occupancy of 43 people was created after the Police Department described threats that were made toward representatives of the Village, but also sharing that remaining space of assembly is located within the main floor of the Village Hall.
The PAC offered alternatives that the Board could have provided the public with, including moving the meetings to a larger meeting room, offering standing room or overflow capacity, or otherwise attempting to make the meeting reasonably accessible to the public. The PAC found that, even assuming there were bona fide threats to the Mayor’s safety, the Board’s security concerns did not justify so heavily curtailing public attendance at the meetings. The PAC interpreted the Fire Chief’s letter to confirm that accommodating additional members of the public was possible on the main floor of the Village Hall. The PAC found that the “reasonable accessibility” standard required the Board to implement measures to better accommodate the public. The PAC concluded that the Board’s failures to provide meetings in places convenient and open to the public violated OMA.
This opinion is binding only to the parties involved and may be appealed pursuant to State law.
The complete Public Access Opinion 24-010 can be found here.