EDITORIAL: Public should have 24-hour notice on what is going to happen at meetings
Reporters can be an irascible bunch, and one surefire way to raise their blood pressure is the prospect of covering a municipal or school board meeting and not knowing what is going to be on the agenda.
Sure, governmental bodies in Pennsylvania have long been required to make their agendas a matter of public record, but some of them have been pretty bad about giving the wider world a heads-up on matters they will be discussing or actions they will be taking. The worst of the lot don’t post agendas at all beforehand, or do so just minutes before a meeting gets underway.
But what does or doesn’t irritate the Fourth Estate is not the issue here. The larger problem is that citizens are being left in the dark if they don’t have some idea in advance what elected officials are going to be doing in public meetings. How can they go and speak their minds about a potential tax increase if it’s only made public at the last second? How can they have their say about whether zoning should be altered to accommodate a nearby business if they have no clue that a vote is imminent?
Fortunately, this practice will soon be prohibited. Last week, Gov. Tom Wolf signed a measure that would require government agencies, local municipalities and school districts to post their meeting agendas online at least 24 hours in advance. It will go into effect around Sept. 1. Wolf signed off on it after it was unanimously approved by both houses of the General Assembly. Under this new law, once an agenda is unveiled, officials cannot make decisions on items that are not on the agenda unless they are emergencies.
Several other states already have requirements in place that require agendas be posted 24 or 48 hours in advance. During his tenure, former state Rep. Jim Christiana, the Beaver County Republican who represented the 15th Legislative District in Harrisburg, championed making copies of meeting agendas available in advance, and many other citizens and elected officials have been agitating for years to put this change to the Sunshine Law on the books.
Liz Wagenseller, executive director of the Pennsylvania Office of Open Records, said providing notice on what elected officials will be talking about and voting on is critical to “promoting open and knowledgeable dialogue between citizens and government officials, and we look forward to the continued work of the Legislature to improve government responsiveness and transparency.”
She added, “The opportunity to review an agenda before a public meeting is a positive step towards increasing government accountability and citizen participation.”
We all need to remember that we are citizens first and foremost, and, in a democracy, elected officials are working for us. That being the case, it’s not asking too much to find out in advance the work they will be doing.