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Subject: Chapel Hill Technology Advisory Committee

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  • From: Terri Buckner <tbuckner AT ibiblio.org>
  • To: Chapel Hill Information Technology Advisory Committee <chtechcomm AT lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: [Chtechcomm] Question posed to NGLGISA
  • Date: Thu, 07 Jul 2005 13:10:22 -0400

Martha Holyman (new committee member) has posed the following questions to a School of Government listserv that servces information technology officials within NC local governments. She will share any responses she gets:

Question 1: A number of volunteer advisory committees appointed by either the Chapel Hill Town Council or the Orange County Board of County Commissioners use listservs to communicate to all committee members and elected officials on committee-specific topics. These communications venture beyond just sharing of information into discussing issues and, occasionally, reaching conclusions or making decisions.

It has recently been noted that the use of listservs could, if substantial business is being conducted, be considered a committee or board meeting and thus would be in violation of the public meetings law.

Do any of you have policies or procedures in place to guide advisory boards and committees in their use (or not) of listservs? For that matter, do you have any policies or procedures in place for the use of any type of information-sharing technology as it relates to the public meetings law?

Any information on how you handle this situation would be most helpful.

Question 2: Do you have any policies or guidelines for the use of email by elected and appointed officials? I am specifically interested in the retention of those emails and the applicability of the public records law. Does the public records law apply when the official is using a personal (non-government) email address? When a citizen sends an official an email, does it then become part of the public record? Are there particular circumstances where it does not?

Do you have a suggested wording for disclaimers to include in emails from elected or appointed officials to indicate that the correspondence is part of public record?




  • [Chtechcomm] Question posed to NGLGISA, Terri Buckner, 07/07/2005

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