Get Full Government Meeting Transcripts, Videos, & Alerts Forever!
Get email alerts on the Open Meetings topic
No spam. Unsubscribe anytime.
Bogalusa council adopts resolution to remedy open-meetings complaint, nullifies recent appointments
Summary
At a special Oct. 14 meeting the Bogalusa City Council adopted a resolution to address an open-meetings complaint (No. 202550), nullified certain Aug. 19 appointments to boards and directed that affected nominations be re-submitted; the meeting included public challenges to how the agenda was posted.
At a special call meeting on Oct. 14, 2025, the Bogalusa City Council adopted a resolution intended to remedy an open-meetings complaint filed with the attorney general’s office (Complaint No. 202550) and nullified appointments made at an Aug. 19 meeting to the parks and recreation board and two planning-and-zoning nominations, the council said.
The action came after public commenters alleged the agenda for the Oct. 14 meeting had not been properly posted. A participant identified by others in the meeting as Mr. McNeel told the council that the agenda on the front door and on social media displayed incorrect dates and that he had video and metadata to support his claim, saying the lack of a properly posted agenda would render the meeting noncompliant with open-meetings law.
Secretary Edwards, who handles postings, told the council the agenda for the special call meeting was created on Oct. 10 and posted to the city website and the council’s Facebook pages. “Today’s agenda was created on October 10th and it was posted on the website and it was also posted to Facebook,” Secretary Edwards stated, and she acknowledged she had entered incorrect dates on some printed agendas and had corrected those entries.
During discussion, Miss Gohead (a council member who spoke during the meeting) cautioned that the attorney general’s office did not explicitly say the council’s earlier procedures were fully correct, but said the AG’s office had advised that errors could be remedied by calling a special meeting or taking corrective steps. “The attorney general didn’t say that what you were doing was correct. It said that you could fix it by calling special,” Miss Gohead said.
Council leaders said the remedy in the resolution would allow the council either to nullify or to ratify votes taken Aug. 19. President Gates and others said the nullification applied specifically to appointments tied to parks and recreation and to two add-on planning-and-zoning nominations added that night; those nominees will be resubmitted under item 6 (appointments and nominations) on a future agenda. The council also said boards-and-commissions policy would be discussed at another time.
A motion to adopt the resolution was made and seconded. The council conducted a roll call; Councilwoman Temples, Councilman Kelly, the Vice President, Councilwoman Douglas, Councilwoman Smith, President Gates and Councilman Dent each registered a response when called. The council recorded the motion as adopted and directed staff to re-submit the affected nominations and to follow any corrective steps advised by legal counsel.
The meeting also included public comments urging the council to post meeting materials online for people with disabilities; some speakers said meeting packets and supporting materials had not been available previously and asked the city to make documents accessible during live and online meetings. The council did not adopt additional materials-access changes during the special call session but noted those concerns for follow up.
The practical outcome is procedural: the resolution resolves Complaint No. 202550 by nullifying the specified Aug. 19 appointments and creating a path to re-submit those nominations; the council said it would address board policy and any remaining posting or records-access issues at a later date.
