§ 1.41. Requirements.
(a) General provisions. A meeting of an agency at which official action or deliberations by a quorum of the members of an agency take place shall be open to the public unless exempt from this subchapter or closed for an executive session. The agencies official actions and deliberations which are covered by this subchapter are defined by § § 1.42, 1.43 and 1.44 (relating to agencies; officialaction; and deliberations). Exemptions from this subchapter are set forth in subsection (i), and executive sessions may be closed as provided by § 1.45 (relatingto executive sessions) .
(b) Voting. Votes taken at open meetings shall be publicly cast and, in the case of role call votes, recorded in the minutes of the agency. Agencies may take official action by notational voting as provided by § 1.43(c).
(c) Minutes. Written minutes of open meetings prepared as set forth in § 1.52 (relating to minutes) shall be kept and made available as a public record for examination and copying.
(d) Public notice. Public notice in the manner provided by § 1.53 (relating to notice) shall be given at least 3 days in advance of an agency’s first regular meeting of each calendar or fiscal year and at least 24 hours in advance of a special meeting or rescheduled meeting.
(e) Emergency meetings. Advance public notice is not required in the case of an emergency meeting as provided by § 1.54 (relating to emergency meetings).
(f) Schedule of regular meetings. An agency shall give public notice of their schedule of regular meetings for the calendar or fiscal year, either prior to or immediately following the agency’s first regular meeting.
(g) Rules of order. An agency may adopt rules and regulations necessary for the conduct of meetings and the preservation of order as provided by § 1.55 (relating to rules and regulations).
(h) Recording devices. Subject to rules and regulations adopted by an agency, as provided by § 1.56 (relating to use of recording devices), a person attending an open meeting of the agency has the right to use recording devices to record proceedings of the meeting.
(i) Exemptions. An agency is not required to conduct open meetings to hold conferences under § 1.57 (relating to conferences), to take administrative action as provided by § 1.58 (relating to administrative action) or, as set forth in § 1.59 (relating to exemptions), to take official action or conduct deliberations regarding a matter which, if conducted in public, would violate a lawful privilege or lead to the disclosure of information or confidentiality protected by law, including the investigation of violations of law and quasi-judicial deliberations.
(j) Meeting locations. An agency shall conduct open meetings at locations reasonably accessible by members of the public and with adequate seating and other facilities to allow effective public observation and, if appropriate, participation in agency deliberations. A meeting site shall be accessible to handicapped individuals and shall either be within a public building or at a location fully open and available to members of the general public. A meeting may not be conducted at a private club or another location not customarily accessible by members of the public.
(k) Violations. An agency is not authorized to conduct formal adjudications of complaints regarding alleged violations of this subchapter, but if an agencydetermines that it has violated this subchapter, the agency may cure the defective procedure in the manner provided by § 1.60 (relating to violations).
No part of the information on this site may be reproduced for profit or sold for profit.
This material has been drawn directly from the official Pennsylvania Code full text database. Due to the limitations of HTML or differences in display capabilities of different browsers, this version may differ slightly from the official printed version.
