The vote and/or unanimous decision rendered by the Catskill Village Board recently on the question of a Black Lives Matter mural did not occur at a validly held open meeting, according to the state Committee on Open Government. In an August 4 email in response to a request from WGXC-FM, the committee opined that taking action on a matter of public concern at a time or in a way outside of a valid public meeting is "inconsistent with the law... [I]f a series of email communications among members of a village board involves action taken by the board, we would agree that a meeting would effectively have been held in contravention of the Open Meetings Law." In a June 30 statement posted on the Village of Catskill Facebook page, the board announced it was rejecting a community request to paint a Black Lives Matter mural on Main Street in the village. According to the statement, "After careful and thoughtful deliberation, our Board of Trustees has decided that the proposed mural on our Main Street should take the form of a banner." The post went on to enumerate multiple reasons for the decision and closed with, "Thank you, Vincent Seeley and the Village of Catskill Board of Trustees. Joe Kozloski – Natasha Law – Pete Grasse – Greg Smith." However, there is no record of a vote having been taken and accounts of what occurred are contradictory. Shoshanah Bewlay, the Executive Director of the Committee on Open Government, spoke to WGXC about the issue. PLAY EXCERPT HERE. Seeley originally said there was a vote, the matter was discussed at length and the decision was unanimous. Law denied there was ever an actual vote saying the decision was more of a recommendation. Asked to comment about the Committee for Open Government's feedback this week, Seeley offered a different story in an August 10 email. "We did not take a vote over email. Why is this so confusing? We made a recommendation for the banner. Stop trying to make this something it is not. For this type of action, there did not need to be a vote...," he wrote. Asked to confirm that there was no discussion amongst the trustees about the request either individually, or as a group during the last week of June, Seeley did not answer. Adding to the confusion, there is no official record to rely upon. Board meeting minutes have not been published at Village of Catskill [dot] net since late March. Asked if the village plans to publish the missing minutes or to make the meeting recordings available to the public sometime soon, Seeley was likewise mum.


More information about this report, for informational purposes:

Shoshanah Bewlay, the Executive Director of the Committee on Open Government, spoke to WGXC about the issue. Click here to listen to the full interview:
https://data.wavefarm.org/20200812001918/ShoshanahBewlay_NYCommOpenGovt_BerneCatskilletc_20200811_20200831.mp3

Here is the New York State Committee on Open Government full opinion on the matter:
Based on the information you have provided, it does not appear that the vote/unanimous decision of the Village Board of Trustees occurred at a validly-held open meeting. If members of the village board discussed and took action on a matter of public concern by email, that would be in violation of several of the provisions of the Open Meetings Law. Please see this previously-prepared advisory opinion addressing this question, in which Committee staff advised: “there are only two ways in which a public body may validly conduct a meeting: by means of a physical gathering or a gathering by means of video-conference. Any other means of conducting a meeting, i.e., by telephone conference, by mail, or by e-mail, would be inconsistent with law. . . [I]f a series of email communications among members of a village board involves action taken by the board, we would agree that a meeting would effectively have been held in contravention of the Open Meetings Law.”

Here is WGXC's original query to New York State's Committee on Open Government:
Hello,
Community radio station WGXC (wgxc.org) would like an advisory opinion on the following matter. On June 30 the Village of Catskill released what Village President Vincent Seeley repeatedly called a vote, and has now said was a decision, on whether or not to place a "Black Lives Matter" mural on Main Street in the village. He said the vote was unanimous among the Village Trustees. The board also released a long statement, with many bullet points, on the issue. The board last met June 24, without a decision on the matter. The board did not meet again until July. Seeley said the vote, and the text, were taken and crafted via email. The question we have is if this is allowed out of a public meeting, under Gov. Cuomo's March 7 executive order about town meetings.

Hudson Common Council President Tom DePietro was asked about the issue. Click here to hear his response:
https://data.wavefarm.org/20200812001900/TomDepietro_HudsonCommonCouncilPresident_onCatskillVillageDecision_EVERGREEN.mp3