Hundreds of secret WNC county meetings, with few details released

The Asheville Citizen Times reports on an investigation by Carolina Public Press into how often county commissioners in North Carolina’s western counties went into closed session last year.

The article quotes SMVT attorney Amanda Martin:

“I get called with some frequency” about closed sessions, said Amanda Martin, an attorney for the North Carolina Press Association, which advocates for government openness on behalf of the state’s media outlets.

While open meetings law is extremely complex, it doesn’t leave many gray areas, Martin said.

According to case law that has developed over the years, “the statutes are to be construed broadly in favor of openness and narrowly in favor of exemptions,” she said.

Commissioners aren’t allowed to go into closed sessions simply because they want to have a private discussion, she added, and any member of the public can mount a legal challenge to suspect closed meetings.

“You can sue to get a determination that violations have occurred and stop them from recurring,” she said, adding that that’s a route rarely taken.

You can read the entire article here.