File: BEC

EXECUTIVE SESSIONS

All meetings of the school committee are open to attendance by the public and media representatives. However, the committee has the right to convene in a closed executive session when it meets the following procedural conditions imposed by state law:

1. The committee will first convene in an open session for which due notice has been given.

2. The chairperson (or, in his or her absence, the presiding member) will state the purpose for the executive session.

3. A majority of the members must vote to enter the executive session, with the vote taken by roll call and recorded in the official minutes.

4. The chairperson or presiding member will state before entering the executive session whether the committee will reconvene in open session after the executive session.

The law puts specific limitations on the purposes for which executive sessions may be convened. The committee may enter executive sessions to:

1. Discuss the reputation, character, physical condition or mental health, rather than the professional competence, of a single individual.

2. Consider the discipline or dismissal, including the hearing of charges against, a member of the committee, a school department employee or student, or other individual.

(In the first two cases listed, an open meeting will be held if the individual involved so requests.)

3. Discuss strategy with respect to collective bargaining or litigation, if an open meeting might have a detrimental effect. Collective bargaining may also be conducted.

4. Discuss the deployment of security personnel or devices.

5. Investigate charges of criminal misconduct or to discuss the filing of criminal complaints.

6. Consider transactions of real estate, if an open meeting might be detrimental to the negotiating position of the committee or another party.

7. Comply with the provisions of any general or specific laws of federal grant-in-aid requirements.

8. Consider and interview applicants for employment. (The only position that the school committee would be involved in that might qualify would be for the position of superintendent.) This exemption only applies if it can be determined that an open meeting will have a detrimental affect in obtaining qualified applicants.

9. Meet or confer with a mediator with respect to any litigation or public business.

10. To discuss trade secret or confidential, competitively-sensitive or other proprietary information provided in the course of activities conducted by a governmental body as an energy supplier.

Accurate records of the proceedings conducted in executive session will be kept and may remain secret only so long as their publication would defeat the purpose of the session. The committee will review executive session minutes for possible declassification at least once each year.

All votes taken in executive session will be recorded roll call votes, and will become part of the minutes of executive session.

[Adopted: 3/8/99]

[Revised: January 2002]

[Revised: November 2011]

LEGAL REFS.:

M.G.L. 30A: 18-25