Iowa City Press-Citizen
01-09-07
Legislators may rewrite meeting laws
By Brian Morelli
Iowa City Press-Citizen
Some legislators talked informally Monday about examining and possibly
rewriting Iowa Open Meeting laws during the 2007 legislative session.
"The Legislature needs to look at virtual meetings or rolling meetings and see if it
violates the law," Sen. Matt McCoy, D-Des Moines, said on the opening day of
the session.
The remarks were sparked by questions of how the Iowa state Board of Regents
conducts business. In November, regents ended a board meeting in closed
session without adjourning. Then they met unannounced several times in the
next week before adjourning during a phone meeting.
That prompted a lawsuit by the Press-Citizen, which states that the regents
violated open meeting laws by not providing times, dates and locations of the
board's weeklong meeting and discussed process issues in closed sessions
involving the search for a University of Iowa president.
In December, the regents discussed the search process during a week of e-mail
exchanges. That led to formally voting to name UI College of Dentistry Dean
David Johnsen to serve as chairman for the second search for a school
president.
Regents have said their lawyers advised them that they are within the law on the
issue of the weeklong meeting, but open meeting experts say the board
members violated the spirit of the law.
Many legislators said openness should be the issue.
"We want to model government after business, but businesses don't have the
same responsibilities. Maybe it is time the Legislature needs to remind regents
the importance of openness," McCoy said.
McCoy said the issue at hand is the balance between the busy lives of regents
and the need for openness.
"I understand the regents are all busy people. At the same time, I understand the
public's right to know. We are faced with a conflict of these two worlds," he said.
Rep. Art Staed, D-Cedar Rapids, said the priority for the Legislature is finding a
UI president, keeping tuition affordable and making higher education accessible,
not investigating the regents.
"I don't think there was any intention to deceive. If anything, it's a problem with
the law. We can take a look at that and make it clearer," Staed said.
Sen. David Johnson, R- Ocheyedan, said controversial issues surrounding the
nine-member board are because of a "unique" relationship with the UI campus.
"My question is why are we not hearing the same concerns raised on the campus
of University of Northern Iowa and Iowa State University?" Johnson said. "You
can always raise the specter of the spirit of the law, but the question is whether it
violated the law."