[Topic] Library Law, Municipal Law, School Law, Special Districts
The Open Meetings Act (5 ILCS 120/1 et seq.) requires all counties, townships, cities, villages, incorporated towns, school districts and all other municipal corporations, boards, bureaus, committees or commissions to keep written minutes of all of their meetings, whether open or closed, and a verbatim record of all their closed meetings in the form of an audio or video recording. (5 ILCS 120/2.06)
The statute sets forth the following minimum requirements for these minutes:
1. the date, time and place of the meeting;
2. the members of the public body recorded as either present or absent and whether the members were physically present or present by means of video or audio conference, and
3. a summary of discussion on all matters proposed, deliberated, or decided, and a record of any votes taken.
On a motion to go into a closed meeting, the minutes must contain the vote of each member and the identification of the specific exception contained in Section 2 of the Act which authorizes the closing of the meeting to the public. (5 ILCS 120/2a) In addition, if there is a closed meeting on “probable or imminent litigation”, the basis for the finding must be specified in the minutes. This finding should be included in the minutes of the closed meeting. (5 ILCS 120/2 (c) (11))
The minutes of meetings open to the public must be made available for public inspection within 7 days of their approval by the public body. Any public body that has a website that the full-time staff of the public body maintains must post the minutes of a regular meeting of its governing body open to the public on the public body’s website within 7 days of the approval of the minutes by the public body. Any such minutes posted on the public body’s website must remain posted on the website for at least 60 days after their initial posting.
The verbatim record of closed meetings may be destroyed without notification to or the approval of any records commission or the State Archivist under the Local Records Act or the State Records Act no less than 18 months after the completion of the meeting recorded but only after:
1 the public body approves the destruction of a particular recording; and
2 the public body approves minutes of the closed meeting that meet the minimum requirements set out above.
2 the public body approves minutes of the closed meeting that meet the minimum requirements set out above.
Furthermore, the public body must periodically, but no less than semi-annually, meet to review minutes of all closed meetings. At this meeting the public body must determine and report in an open session that (1) the need for confidentiality still exists as to all or part of those minutes or (2) that the minutes or portions thereof no longer require confidential treatment and are available for public inspection. Minutes of closed meetings shall be available only after the public body determines that it is no longer necessary to protect the public interest or the privacy of an individual by keeping them confidential. For a more complete discussion of minutes and the Open Meetings Act, see the Manual on Illinois “Sunshine Laws”, The Open Meetings and Freedom of Information Act, authored by members of the firm of Klein, Thorpe & Jenkins, published and distributed by the Illinois Municipal League. You may purchase copies of this manual from the League by going to the League’s Website: http://www.iml.org, then at the top of the page click on Resources, then on the right-hand side menu click on Handbooks & Manuals, then click on Illinois Sunshine Laws and place your order.