Open Meetings Act

One of the bills that was passed by the Ohio General Assembly at the end of 2024 was House Bill (HB) 257. The bill, which is effective on April 9, 2025, enacted Ohio Revised Code (RC) 121.221, which allows some public bodies to hold meetings by video conference or similar electronic technology. (For purposes of this blog post, I’ll refer to these meetings as “virtual meetings.”) However, as discussed below, this provision does not allow boards of education to conduct virtual meetings and may actually make virtual attendance at meetings more restrictive.

One perennial favorite topic on OSBA’s legal hotline is executive sessions. Lately, we’ve been getting questions about whether the information discussed in executive session is legally confidential. It seems like it should be – after all, the board is going behind closed doors to have private discussions on sensitive matters. But is it?

A consent agenda is a parliamentary procedure tool that allows boards to streamline the approval of routine, non-controversial items that typically do not need discussion or debate. The general idea is to save time by grouping self-explanatory items together and approving them in one motion, instead of handling each one individually.

This week’s blog post examines cell phone usage and schools, including the new law requiring districts to adopt a policy on student cell phone use and legal issues related to cell phone use by board members.

Under Ohio’s Open Meetings Act, boards and other public bodies are permitted to enter executive session to discuss specific topics spelled out in the law. In essence, executive session is a built-in exception to the general requirement that public bodies conduct their deliberations in public. This provision recognizes that the nature of certain topics makes privacy and discretion in deliberations paramount.

In today’s Legal Ledger Sidebar, Sara Clark and John Price discuss committees and subcommittees, which is a topic that comes up frequently for our members. Specifically, they discuss when committees are required to comply with the Open Meetings Act and what that means.

In today's Legal Ledger, OSBA's division of legal services is introducing its new vlog, Sidebars, which will feature short conversations about legal issues frequently raised on the hotline and other topics. Today's Sidebar is a discussion between Sara and Jennie on executive sessions, which is a perennial hot topic. We'll cover the basics, delve into new case law, and provide practical guidance on how to manage executive sessions. 

Ohio law requires boards of education to record the proceedings of their meetings. This document, which is more commonly known as the “minutes” of a meeting, constitutes the official record of all board actions and serves an important role in providing key information to members of the public.

Many school districts use their annual organizational meeting as a time to make board committee appointments. As school boards create new committees or invite new members to serve on these committees, it’s a good time to review the applicability of the Open Meetings Act to committees.