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Committee debates H.145 language on disruptive conduct at public-body meetings and disorderly conduct statute
Summary
Committee reviewed draft language tied to H.145 that would clarify when disruption at an open meeting can amount to disorderly conduct, discussed adding language reflecting the Vermont Supreme Court's standard from State v. Colby, and recommended moving clarifying language to Government Operations for further work.
The House Judiciary Committee reviewed language tied to H.145 regarding disruptive conduct during open meetings and whether to amend Vermont’s disorderly conduct statute to clarify when a person’s actions can be cited for substantially impairing the effective conduct of a public-body meeting.
Tucker Anderson, counsel with Legislative Council, briefed the committee on the proposal and described the tension between existing disorderly-conduct law and open-meetings practice. Anderson said Representative Harrison’s bill would: (1) include legislative intent referencing the Vermont Supreme Court’s decision in State v. Colby, (2) give public bodies express authority to adopt rules on public participation, and (3) amend 13 V.S.A. § 1026 (the disorderly conduct statute) to add a basis for citation when a person’s conduct "substantially impairs the effective conduct of a meeting of a public body."
Anderson reviewed how the Supreme Court in State v. Colby interprets that threshold and noted the court’s guidance that courts evaluate the conduct’s timing, duration and intensity rather than the content of the speech. He summarized two illustrative examples the court gave: conduct that forces a lawful meeting to terminate prematurely; and repeated, sustained disruptive behavior after the person has been warned and asked to stop.
Discussion focused on whether rules governing public participation should be discretionary for public bodies or mandatory, and on potential risks of vesting excessive discretion in meeting chairs. Anderson explained that Representative Harrison’s draft keeps adoption of rules discretionary. He said the bill requires that rules that could lead to exclusion be adopted by the public body (not by a chair alone) to provide notice and objective standards for enforcement. Committee members asked about virtual meetings, signage, ecclesiastical moderators, and whether members of a public body could themselves be charged; Anderson and Legislative Counsel said those are context-specific questions that courts would evaluate under existing case law.
Members suggested shifting the descriptive Colby examples from the bill’s legislative-intent section into the statutory text (or into a new subdivision that echoes the court’s standard) to reduce confusion; Anderson supported moving that clarification into the operative text. Several members raised First Amendment concerns and said they wanted bright-line notice for meeting participants. Law enforcement representatives in discussion said objective criteria (for example: repeated warnings, timing, duration, and intensity) may assist enforcement and that the bill’s language would not eliminate the need for nuanced application.
The committee recommended that Government Operations consider adding the Supreme Court’s interpretive examples into the statutory language or otherwise clarify the standard. No formal change to the disorderly conduct statute was adopted by the Judiciary Committee at this meeting; the committee framed and approved suggested clarifications for consideration by Government Operations.
Ending: Committee members asked Legislative Council to pass the suggested clarifying language to Government Operations and to monitor how other states address virtual meetings and definitions of assemblies.
