State Senator considering legal action against state school board, Walters

A state lawmaker says she’s ready to take the state school board and State Superintendent Ryan Walters to court after she says they violated Oklahoma's Open Meeting Act when they refused to let her sit in on their executive session discussions last week.

OKLAHOMA CITY (KFOR) — A state lawmaker says she’s ready to take the state school board and State Superintendent Ryan Walters to court after she says they violated Oklahoma's Open Meeting Act when they refused to let her sit in on their executive session discussions last week.

State Senator Mary Boren (D-Norman) says the law makes it very clear, as someone who serves on the Oklahoma Senate’s education committee, she should have been allowed in the room during the Oklahoma State Board of Education’s executive session during their meeting last week. 

In addition to state school board members and their legal staff, State Superintendent Ryan Walters and some of his executive staff also regularly take part in the board’s executive sessions, including last week.

“We just don't have enough people holding Superintendent Walters accountable,” Boren told News 4. “And one of the basic things that I'm able to do by law is to observe executive session hearings to ensure that he's held accountable.”

She said a number of things on the executive session agenda from last week’s meeting piqued her interest.

“There was one item on the agenda regarding the disqualification of one of the school board members, and they voted on that in executive session,” Boren said. “And then there was several agenda items on other teachers whose certificates were in the process of being revoked… I knew that my district really cared about that.”

She says she informed the state school board’s attorney she planned to exercise her right to sit in on the executive session in advance of the meeting last week.

“Last Thursday, I emailed the attorney for the board and notified her that I would was intending to observe the executive session that was on the agenda for that day,” Boren said. “And when they broke for executive session, I walked up to the attorney and I said, ‘Hey, did you get my email?’ And she said, ‘yes.’ And she said, ‘Come this way.’ So I started walking with her and I turned to go into the executive session room towards that door.”

But she says the attorney never let her walk in the door.

“And she said, ‘wait a minute, Mary, we need to talk. You can't go in there.’ And I said, ‘Oh.’ And then at that point, I was informed that they didn't think that I had jurisdictional connection with what was happening in the executive session and also thought that the attorney client privilege would be violated if I was in there to observe.”

Tim Gilpin is an attorney, a former member of the state school board and a former Assistant Oklahoma Attorney General. He knows Oklahoma’s Open Meeting Act well.

He told News 4, the Act does allow for legislators who serve on committees overseeing an agency to sit in on that agency’s executive sessions.

“In order to go into executive session—which means all the people watching have to leave, only the board that the head of the board and the board's counsel can be present—the Oklahoma Open Meeting Act requires only certain topics can be discussed in an executive session,” Gilpin said. “There is a little caveat that one of our state legislators who is serving on specific education committee is allowed… to attend.”

Gilpin says he’s not aware of any clauses in the Open Meeting Act that would have allowed the state school board to make an exception in Boren’s case.

“I don't know why they didn't want [Boren] there, but I suspect a judge is going to have to decide what's going on,” Gilpin said.

Boren says she wants Attorney General Gentner Drummond to give an opinion on whether or not it was legal for the board to prevent her from entering.

“And then once that happens, I hope that I can take that to the State Department of Education, State Board of Education's attorneys, and explain to them why the law says what it does and how their decisions last Thursday didn't conform to the law and ask them to reevaluate their position so that moving forward that they can be in compliance with the law,” Boren said.

Boren says, if they still refuse to allow her access after that, she is ready to sue.

“I am preparing to talk to attorneys to file a petition to enforce Open Meeting Act,” Boren said.

If Boren were to sue and a judge were to find the state school board willfully violated the Open Meeting Act, Gilpin says a number of things could happen.

“A violation of the Open Meeting Act can include fines,” Gilpin said. “It could actually include jail time for very serious offenses. The idea is that these public officials are not discussing issues or deciding issues in executive session. It's not like a good old boys roundtable where they're going to decide the issues and no one gets to see or hear.”