Possible Sunshine Law Violation Forces Cobb School Board Revote

COBB COUNTY, GA — A special meeting of the Cobb County School District Board of Education is set for Thursday to revote on its fiscal year 2021-22 budget after the district may have violated Georgia's sunshine laws at last week's board meeting.

The board approved a $1.5 billion budget for FY 2021-22 last Thursday, but did so without livestreaming its 6:30 p.m. budget hearing or posting an archived, recorded version to its website. Members of the media, including a Marietta Daily Journal reporter, and the public were also not allowed inside to watch in person due to COVID-19 restrictions.

A district spokesperson cited COVID-19 restrictions as a reason to not allow anyone in the room during the hearing, as well as technical difficulties which prevented the livestream and recording. Members of the public and media haven't been allowed to attend Cobb Schools board meetings in person since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic last year, but will once again be able to go in person starting in July.

Both the 1 p.m. work session and 7 p.m. official board meeting last week were both livestreamed and posted online afterward, but not the 6:30 p.m. budget hearing.

Georgia's sunshine laws include the Open Records Act and the Open Meetings Act, the latter of which may have been violated. According to the law, all government entities' meetings — including school districts — must be open to the public, excluding executive sessions.

The term "sunshine laws" traces back to the Government in the Sunshine Act, a federal law enacted in 1976 (and other state-level "sunshine laws" that predate the federal one) following the Watergate and Panama Papers scandals. Its intention was to create greater transparency in the government, or shed sunlight on it.

Nan Kiel, a spokesperson for the district, told the MDJ that the district must only allow public attendance or livestreaming for meetings that require a vote. But the law says all meetings in which there is a quorum of members of the governing body must be open to the public (with only a handful of exceptions), not just the ones that require a vote.

“Traditionally, the public has real-time access to budget hearings through physical attendance. While under COVID-19 restrictions, the legal requirement to provide real-time public access to budget hearings has occurred through live-stream," a district spokesperson told Patch. "Due to technical difficulties, the live-stream did not occur during our second budget hearing.

"Instead, and to ensure public access to the budget hearing, the Board will hold another budget hearing, with real-time access to the public provided through live-stream, with a Board vote to follow. We work hard so mistakes are rare and when they do occur, are fixed.”

David Johnson, general counsel for the Georgia Press Association, told the MDJ that Kiel's responses are not valid. Richard T. Griffiths, spokesperson for the Georgia First Amendment Foundation, told the Atlanta Journal-Constitution that the board needs to review open meetings and open records laws and make sure it fully understands them.

“The very fact that this meeting took place without the ability to know what was said or someone observing what was being said is clearly a serious open government problem,” Griffiths said.

The board meets at 10:30 a.m. Thursday for the hearing at 514 Glover St. in Marietta. The official meeting begins at 11 a.m.

You can view Cobb County Schools board agendas here.