If an agenda for a special city council meeting doesn’t say that members will vote on something, are they allowed to vote anyway?
It’s a question that South Carolina’s highest court will answer in the coming weeks as part of one man’s bid to show that the Mount Pleasant Town Council skirted open-government laws in 2008 by hiding contentious decisions behind incomplete agendas. In a series of special meetings that included executive sessions on the topic, town leaders pushed through a Shem Creek land deal that cost taxpayers $6 million for a tract worth half that.
A ruling in favor of Steve Brock, the former TV station executive and planning commission member who sued the town, could further define the S.C. Freedom of Information Act by saying that governing bodies statewide must give advance notice of all anticipated actions at special meetings, even when they occur after executive sessions. Continue…
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