Board members access to all correspondence that board chairman and community hired attorney have

[DMZ]

Can the chairman of the board and the  attorney hired to assist the board refuse to share documents and communications from the county? Instead there is a summary which contains the views of the county provided by the attorney. As a board member with responsibility to make fiscal and oversight decisions it seems critical to know what is really going on. 
 

 

[Atul Kapur]

The board could adopt a motion requiring or ordering the chairman to provide the documents.

Who is paying the attorney / who is the attorney's client? If it is the organization, then the attorney should take instructions from the body authorized to make decisions for the organization should be the body giving instructions to the attorney; I doubt that this is the chairman alone. 

Edited June 26, 2023 at 01:59 AM by Atul Kapur
Put emphasis on the parliamentary aspects of the organization, rather than advising a lawyer who to listen to

[Josh Martin]

On 6/25/2023 at 1:58 PM, DMZ said:

Can the chairman of the board and the  attorney hired to assist the board refuse to share documents and communications from the county? Instead there is a summary which contains the views of the county provided by the attorney. As a board member with responsibility to make fiscal and oversight decisions it seems critical to know what is really going on. 

As a parliamentary matter, the chair is not required to turn this information over upon the request of an individual board member. However, the board could, by majority vote, order the chair to do so.

It may well be there are applicable laws which would grant individual board members a right to these documenters, but that is beyond the scope of RONR and this forum.

[DMZ]

Thanks for the response. To further clarify… if all members of the board have equal power why would a vote be needed to have correspondence and documents provided to the entire board? Why would the chairman and certain board members only have the privilege of this visibility.   Again, thanks for your insight. 

[Gary Novosielski]

Well, they shouldn't, but without a vote, nothing changes.  The alternative is scornful looks, which are not as effective.

[Josh Martin]

On 7/4/2023 at 10:48 PM, DMZ said:

To further clarify… if all members of the board have equal power why would a vote be needed to have correspondence and documents provided to the entire board? Why would the chairman and certain board members only have the privilege of this visibility.   Again, thanks for your insight. 

There are certain documents which RONR provides that all members have access to. This is not one of them. There is no rule in RONR concerning access to "correspondence and documents" generally or to the types of documents described here in particular. The organization is free to adopt its own rules on this matter if it wishes. In the absence of such rules, it is at the board's discretion which persons shall have access to the documents in question.

I would also again repeat that "It may well be there are applicable laws which would grant individual board members a right to these documents, but that is beyond the scope of RONR and this forum." That may be something to look into.