CARBONDALE - The Illinois attorney general's office is recommending members of the Carbondale City Council complete training on the state's Open Meetings Act after an incident reported in May.

Documents obtained by The Southern show correspondence between Attorney General Lisa Madigan's office and Carbondale City Attorney Mike Kimmel.

In the exchange of letters, Kimmel acknowledges a tape recorder was turned off in a closed session of the city council.

The Open Meetings Act requires that public bodies "keep written minutes of all their meetings, whether open or closed" and a "verbatim record of all their closed meetings in the form of an audio or video recording."

The city failed to do this at a May 6 closed session meeting when, over the objections of three council members, Mayor Brad Cole turned off the tape recorder for a period of "less than one minute," according to a June 17 letter from Kimmel's office.

Kimmel writes that the incident happened after he was excused from the meeting, along with former City Manager Jeff Doherty and City Clerk Janet Vaught, so the council could discuss personnel issues.

The discussion not recorded pertained to possible litigation concerning Vaught, whose job duties include keeping recordings of city council meetings.

"The mayor believed that this put the city in the untenable position of having a possible litigant having access to all confidential deliberations by the council," Kimmel wrote.

In a previous incident in which just such a situation arose, the city used a second tape to record; that tape was "maintained" by the City Attorney's office. Kimmel wrote that on May 6, "The Mayor had been unable to obtain a second tape."

A response from Madigan's office dated June 24 said "there seems to be no disagreement that the council violated the Open Meetings Act in the act of failing to create a complete verbatim recording of the closed session meeting."

The letter goes on to note that the council, through its correspondence, accepted responsibility for the violation and "has made assurances that it will not again fail to record any portion of a closed session meeting" before recommending council members complete a training on the act.

Reached by phone, Cole said the city has a strong track record of adhering to the Open Meetings Act and that the infraction is one minor incident.

"This was a self-reported minor infraction and has been fully resolved with the attorney general's office," he said. The matter was "pertaining to potential litigation regarding one of the employees that was asked to leave, and the council was all present at that time. It is my opinion that it is not a significant matter."

Council members Chris Wissmann, Joel Fritzler and Mary Pohlmann each confirmed they objected to the tape recorder being turned off.

"It was such a short period of time that wasn't tape recorded - but that's not the point," Pohlmann said of her objection. "These closed meetings are supposed to be recorded, and that's the law."

Council members Lance Jack and Corene McDaniel said they preferred not to comment on the matter, while Steven Haynes could not be reached for comment.

blackwell.thomas@thesouthern.com

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