[BWNA] ORS 192.620 and Two New Board Proposals

[Rob Vaughn]

Thank you Sacha Gilbert Waggoner for sending this.  With the help of a legal
assistant, I am going to try to dissect the "Sunshine" law, of which I am a
proponent (so my bias is up-front) but with the purpose of showing the BWNA
does *not* in any way fall under it (again, my bias up-front) in needing to
have audio and/or visual records to comply with the law, and that the old
method of hand-writing minutes is still completely valid and the only thing
necessary, and that the possession of audio/visual material by an individual
rather than the BWNA organization may itself be in violation of this law and
may prompt a lawsuit.

>       (1) =93Decision=94 means any determination, action, vote or final =
>=20
>disposition upon a motion, proposal, resolution, order, ordinance or =20
>measure on which a vote of a governing body is required, at any =20

Note that this says "vote of a governing body".  The City of Portland has
deemed that NA's are *NOT* governing bodies, but nonetheless, we can use the
definition below to show that this law is so poorly written, it can apply to a
couple of folks who get together to talk politics and write letters to the
City Council.

>       (2) =93Executive session=94 means any meeting or part of a =
>meeting of a governing body which is closed to certain persons for =20
>deliberation on certain matters.

Again, applies only to "governing bodies".

>       (3) =93Governing body=94 means the members of any public body =20
>which consists of two or more members, with the authority to make =20
>decisions for or recommendations to a public body on policy or =20
>administration.

This is where things have run into legal problems in the City of Portland, and
all of the cases involving NA's have made this a difficult area to where this
entire law may sooner or later be sued upon and struck down.

By clause (3) above, myself and my two good friends, who get together in
public to discuss politics and have a name for our little gang of three, and
who then write up receommendations that I send to the City Council could be
considered a "governing body".  But as we all know, that is absolutely
ridiculous and not what this law was meant to cover, but if taken to the
letter, could be interpreted to.

The key area is below:

>       (4) =93Public body=94 means the state, any regional council, =20
>county, city or district, or any municipal or public corporation, or =20
>any board, department, commission, council, bureau, committee or =20
>subcommittee or advisory group or any other agency thereof.

My three friends could certainly be called an "advisory group" or "advisory
agency" and hence be considered a "governing body".

What needs to be researched is the definition in other areas of Oregon statue
law that defines "governing bodies", which I'm sure we will find are those
defined by receiving funding from and/or having the ability to have direct
affect on Portland City recommendations,

But my main point is with ORS 192.620:

>       192.620 Policy. The Oregon form of government requires an =20
>informed public aware of the deliberations and decisions of governing =20=
>bodies and the information upon which such decisions were made. It is =20=
>the intent of ORS 192.610 to 192.690 that decisions of governing =20
>bodies be arrived at openly. [1973 c.172 =A71]

This is the part that is open to interpretation.  In the Sunnyside NA, in
which I was involved, this came up, and it was determined that the phrase:

"an informed public aware of the deliberations and decisions of governing
bodies and the information upon which such decisions were made."

This means that the meetings must be:

1. Known and open to the public to attend

2. That some form of record keeping, which has always been the hand-writing of
minutes, must take place.

Nothing *MORE* than this is required.  Public notice, open attendance at
meetings, and some form of minutes that can be requested by any Oregon
resident are all that are required by the law.

As such, I propose that the keeping of minutes by the BWNA Secretary by
writing in the notebook, which was what had been done for many years up until
recently, fully and completely complies with the law.  There is nothing in the
statues that says that any more "detailed" or "accurate" forms are needed, and
that the invention of newer technology is in any way a requirement for
satisfaction of and compliance with the "Sunshine Law".

And as such, it has been advised to me to propose officially to the BWNA
Noard, in person if necessary, that a vote is taken to decide that all
publically required records are the responsiblity of the BWNA Secretary and
that said records ("minutes") will be, as they once were, by done by writing
or typing on paper by the secretary during the meeting, and that any other
recording devices, audio, visual, both or otherwise, are heretofore banned
from all BWNA meetings by any attending person.

Banning said devices is legal - restaurants banning cell phone use have been
found to be able to do that legally, for example.

I would also propose that all records that have been kept since switching from
or adding onto the hand-written minutes, must be surrendered to the BWNA Board
immediately and stored in the same place that all the minutes have been, which
should be secure, yet publically known and accessable via the secretary.  This
would include all audio and video tape recordings.

In regular speak: we used to just write down minutes, done by the secretary,
and it was a crappy job, and some technologies may make it easier, but in the
interest of having those records publically available, writing them in a
notebook that can be handed to someone, vs. the compilation of hours of video
tape held in the home of one person is both wrong and actually in violation of
these laws.

I intend to run with this one until we're back to writing minutes by hand,
folks, and getting all audio/visual devices banned, so that I can go back to
attending meetings, hiding off in a corner somewhere, but at least some times
willing to raise my hand and open my mouth, without the discomfort and
personally offensive problem of being video taped.

You may now begin trying to argue this, but I would like the board to contact
me to let me know how to make these two proposals above formal and when they
can be brought up for a vote by the board ASAP.  Thank you for reading this
far, and I look forward to hearing others' thoughts as well as probably being
told I'm an idiot.  ;)

Rob V.
BWNA Tech Monkey