Land Use Review Board asks committee for limited Open Meeting Law relief to allow small‑group drafting

Peter Gill, executive director of the Land Use Review Board, told the Government Operations & Military Affairs Committee that the board’s new duties under Act 181 have transformed it from a mostly volunteer panel into a five‑member, full‑time body that performs both permitting and governance work. “We have a permitting program plus we also have all these governance changes that occurred under Act 181,” Gill said during the committee hearing.

Janet Hurley, chair of the Land Use Review Board, said the board lacks the administrative support typical of an executive agency and that holding every preparatory conversation in open session is impractical. “This is a 5 member full time professional board,” Hurley said, adding that requiring all preliminary collaboration to occur in public “is just not efficient or workable for the rest of our staff.”

The board asked the committee to consider a narrow change to the Open Meeting Law to allow small groups of board members to collaborate on guidance documents, draft rules and seek legal advice before bringing a formal proposal to a warned public meeting. Committee members pressed for clarity about existing options: several asked whether the Administrative Procedures Act processes would allow the board to do this work outside open meetings, and whether approvals of regional plans should remain subject to full public deliberation.

Tucker Anderson, legislative counsel, told the committee that under current law “serial communications of any form, including working on the same document, trigger open meeting law requirements,” and warned that allowing unmonitored back‑channel drafting could undercut the statute’s purpose. Anderson noted that some public bodies have tailored exceptions created by statute — for example, the Truth and Reconciliation Commission had specially crafted rules that allowed certain closed deliberations — but said those exceptions were enacted case‑by‑case.

Board officials and committee members agreed on one point in testimony: final decisions on matters such as approvals of regional plans and any formal adoption of rules would be made in public, warned meetings. The board’s request seeks only to create space for preparatory, staff‑style work so that proposals presented in public are more complete and easier for the public to review.

No motions or votes were recorded during the hearing on the board’s request. Committee members said they would continue to solicit feedback and consider statutory language that balances transparency with the board’s need to function efficiently as a full‑time body.