Norman councilman proposes city advisory committees meet publicly, city officials end practice of deleting emails daily

Committees advising the city of Norman would have to abide by the state Open Meeting Act and city emails would be kept for at least one year, under a proposal by Councilman Tom Kovach.

Kovach also wants executive sessions of the city's public bodies to be recorded.

His proposal is on the agenda for the City Council's regular meeting Tuesday.

Under what would become Norman's first records retention policy, "all records, written and electronic, shall be retained for at least 1 year unless there is pending litigation, in which case it will be retained for at least 2 years after the ultimate disposition or the resolution of the litigation."

"I have received stiff opposition to even this limited time," said Kovach. "Staff insists this will put a burden on our existing storage capacity and is trying to limit this. It not perfect but it is better than what they do now, which is delete every day."

Under Kovach's proposal, "all meetings of committees, sub committees and ad hoc committees" would be subject to the Open Meeting Act and to a state statute requiring that notices and agendas for regularly scheduled meetings be posted on the public body's website.

Kovach said this provision is intended to cover advisory committees, even those appointed by the mayor, regardless of whether they have actual or de facto decision-making power.

Kovach is one of five Norman council members to have signed FOI Oklahoma's Open Government Pledge as candidates. The others are Carol Dillingham, Hal Ezzell, Roger Gallagher and Mayor Cindy Rosenthal.

Each promised to "support at every opportunity the public policy of the State of Oklahoma that the people are vested with the inherent right to know and be fully informed about their government so that they can efficiently and intelligently exercise their inherent political power."

Kovach's proposal would do just that.


Joey Senat, Ph.D.
Associate Professor
OSU School of Media & Strategic Communications


The opinions expressed in this blog are those of the commentators and do not necessarily represent the position of FOI Oklahoma Inc., its staff, or its board of directors. Differing interpretations of open government law and policy are welcome.

Supporting documents for deferred prosecution agreement are public under Oklahoma ORA

Question from a reporter: Are a district attorney’s supporting documents related to a deferred prosecution agreement available to the public under the Oklahoma Open Records Act?

Yes, if the deferred prosecution agreement was made after 2000. See OKLA. STAT. tit. 22, § 305.1.

The framework on which this law was crafted is that DPAs were secret until the year 2000. The Oklahoma Press Association was able to secure legislation opening DPAs. But under a compromise with the district attorneys, DPAs entered into prior to the effective date of the law would remain sealed unless confidentiality was waived as part of the original agreement.

For example, former Oklahoma County DA Bob Macy always made confidentiality waivers part of the agreement, so he could have released those made prior to the year 2000. Not so with many other district attorneys.

OKLA. STAT. tit. 22, § 305.5 says DPAs "shall not be released" to anyone who will "use the information for dissemination to the general public." But it also says the provisions of this subsection "shall apply only" with respect to information received or collected … entered into by the parties relating to crimes committed prior to the effective date of this act, unless such information is otherwise deemed confidential by law."

In short, unless some other law closes the supporting information, then it would be open if the DPA was agreed to by the parties after the year 2000.

OKLA. STAT. tit. 22, § 305.2.H.2 says any DPA entered into "prior to the effective date of this act" shall not be a record open to the public, unless confidentiality was waived as a condition of the agreement." That seems to say that all DPAs entered into after the law was effective, including the documentation if no other law excludes it, would be open.

If you cobble together other tidbits of logic, you can also make the same case with subsection 305.4, under which the information becomes confidential when the person completes the program. In other words, records should be open while the person is engaged under the DPA.

A district attorney who decides to terminate the DPA has to tell the other side why the agreement is being terminated, and that is an open record. If the DA terminates an agreement that was entered into prior to the effective date of this act, those supporting documents are open.

Answer provided by Mark Thomas, executive vice president, Oklahoma Press Association

Are Oklahoma Highway Patrol dashboard camera videos a public record?

(Question received today from a reporter.)

No. Public access to the state Department of Public Safety’s audio and video recordings was curtailed by legislators in May 2005. (2005 O.S.L. 199, § 4 (adding OKLA. STAT. tit. 51, § 24A.3(1)(h)(1-3) (effective Nov. 1, 2005))

In March 2005, an Oklahoma County district judge had “barred the Oklahoma Highway Patrol from keeping videotapes of traffic arrests secret.” (Nolan Clay, Highway patrol ordered to stop withholding tapes, THE OKLAHOMAN, Mar. 3, 2005, at A6) An attorney specializing in drunken-driving cases had sued DPS after it refused to release the videotape of such an arrest without the driver’s written consent first.

“We continue to find that many officers make up evidence and exaggerate their testimony about the events. These tapes are extremely important to a citizen who is wrongly accused,” said attorney Stephen G. Fabian Jr.

Fabian had used the Open Records Act to gather hundreds of such videotapes from police departments and OHP.

The subsequent legislative changes to the Act exempted DPS’s audio and video recordings.

In June 2005, Fabian told me he would still be seeking – and likely receiving – the tapes in criminal proceedings via subpoenas.

(Telephone Interview with Stephen G. Fabian Jr., Senior Partner, Fabian & Associates Inc., P.C. (June 16, 2005))

Joey Senat, Ph.D.
Associate Professor
OSU School of Journalism and Broadcasting
“Mass Communication Law in Oklahoma”
joey.senat@okstate.edu