Confusion brewed in the ASUO Student Senate in the past two weeks regarding the proper execution of executive sessions under Oregon’s Public Meetings Law, causing the Senate to violate the law repeatedly.
A total of four violations occurred — three during the Oct. 6 Senate meeting and one during the Oct. 13 meeting. Both Senate President James George and Senate Vice President Colin Andries said the Senate believes because the executive sessions were not the only item on the meeting agenda, no type of notice needed to be given.
Jack Orchard, a private attorney in Portland, said this interpretation is incorrect.
“If they anticipate that there’ll be (an executive session), then it needs to be on the agenda, and it needs to be noted as to reasons for the executive session,” he said.
Andries, a law student, said he “respectfully” disagreed.
“ORS 192.60 says only if we have solely an executive session do we have to” notify the public or news media, he said.
However, Oregon’s Public Meetings Law also requires notice of all regular meetings be given to the public and news media. Kyu Ho Youm, a University professor and John Marshall First Amendment Chair at the School of Journalism and Communication, said an executive session held as part of a regular meeting is considered part of that meeting. Anything included in a regular meeting must be included on the agenda notification sent to the public and news media, he said.
“If there is no mention of the executive session in the public notice, the notice is absolutely a violation of the law,” he said.
Youm said the statute Andries referred to is in place because executive sessions are considered part of regular meetings though they may not be a regular occurrence.
He added that looking at executive sessions as totally separate from regular meetings is not how Oregon’s Public Meetings Law should be interpreted, adding that the Senate’s interpretation was “artful.”
What is most important, Youm said, is not whether the Senate violated the law but whether the Senate knowingly and willfully violated the law. The argument that notification for the executive session is not needed “might be more bona fide,” Youm said, if it “has a lot to do with misunderstanding or simple ignorance.”
Every senator contacted about the executive sessions felt the Senate was within the law by holding them. Andries said he considers the public notice requirement for executive sessions that aren’t the only part of the meeting as “commentary” rather than the actual statute itself.
“It says we should; it doesn’t mean we have to,” he said “The meeting wasn’t solely an executive session meeting; it had both parts.”
Orchard said the law “is very to the point” that advance notification on any executive session is required. There is no need for media outlets to make a separate request for notification of executive session because they are covered by the regular meeting notification requirement, he said.
There are circumstances in which an executive session may be called on a whim, but Orchard said those circumstances are rare and definitely not evident in this situation. The Senate called the executive sessions to discuss the merits of the candidates for president, vice president, treasurer and ombudsman before voting, something Orchard said is not an unanticipated activity.
“It’s hard for me to believe that the election of officers within the ASUO Senate is not a regularly, routinely anticipated event that happens on some kind of periodic basis,” Orchard said, questioning why the election of officers was even something that needed to be done in a closed-door session.
Youm said though the law does not prohibit the discussion of the merits of elected officials to take place in an executive session, whether a governing body decides to do so can be a reflection of its openness to public scrutiny.
This is not the first time confusion about the proper interpretation of laws and guidelines has arisen in the Senate. Summer-session senators questioned whether they had the authority to pass issue resolutions without the title of full Senate.
Despite those concerns, the Senate passed a resolution regarding the Graduate Teaching Fellows Federation’s ongoing contract negotiations with the University on June 24. No conclusion was ever reached in the Senate as to the legitimacy of the resolution.
The Senate has yet to conclude whether the executive sessions held on Oct. 6 and Oct. 13 were in violation of law. Andries said he may be wrong, but his interpretation of the law says the sessions were legal.

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