State Codes and Statutes
Statutes > Nebraska > Chapter84 > 84-141184-1411. Meetings of publicbody; notice; contents; when available; right to modify; duties concerningnotice; videoconferencing or telephone conferencing authorized; emergencymeeting without notice; appearance before public body.(1)Each public body shall give reasonable advance publicized notice of the timeand place of each meeting by a method designated by each public body and recordedin its minutes. Such notice shall be transmitted to all members of the publicbody and to the public. Such notice shall contain an agenda of subjects knownat the time of the publicized notice or a statement that the agenda, whichshall be kept continually current, shall be readily available for public inspectionat the principal office of the public body during normal business hours. Agendaitems shall be sufficiently descriptive to give the public reasonable noticeof the matters to be considered at the meeting. Except for items of an emergencynature, the agenda shall not be altered later than (a) twenty-four hours beforethe scheduled commencement of the meeting or (b) forty-eight hours beforethe scheduled commencement of a meeting of a city council or village boardscheduled outside the corporate limits of the municipality. The public bodyshall have the right to modify the agenda to include items of an emergencynature only at such public meeting.(2) A meeting of a state agency, state board, state commission,state council, or state committee, of an advisory committee of any such stateentity, of an organization created under the Interlocal Cooperation Act, theJoint Public Agency Act, or the Municipal Cooperative Financing Act, of thegoverning body of a public power district having a chartered territory ofmore than fifty counties in this state, ofa board of an educational service unit, or of the governing bodyof a risk management pool or its advisory committees organized in accordancewith the Intergovernmental Risk Management Act may be held by means of videoconferencingor, in the case of the Judicial Resources Commission in those cases specifiedin section 24-1204, by telephone conference, if:(a) Reasonable advance publicized notice is given;(b) Reasonable arrangements are made to accommodate the public'sright to attend, hear, and speak at the meeting, including seating, recordationby audio or visual recording devices, and a reasonable opportunity for inputsuch as public comment or questions to at least the same extent as would beprovided if videoconferencing or telephone conferencing was not used;(c) At least one copy of all documents being considered isavailable to the public at each site of the videoconference or telephone conference;(d) At least one member of the state entity, advisory committee, board, or governing body ispresent at each site of the videoconference or telephone conference; and(e) No more than one-half of the state entity's, advisorycommittee's, board's, orgoverning body's meetings in a calendar year are held by videoconference ortelephone conference.Videoconferencing, telephone conferencing, or conferencingby other electronic communication shall not be used to circumvent any of thepublic government purposes established in the Open Meetings Act.(3) A meeting of aboard of an educational service unit, of the governing body ofan entity formed under the Interlocal Cooperation Act, the Joint Public AgencyAct, or the Municipal Cooperative Financing Act, or of the governing body of a risk managementpool or its advisory committees organized in accordance with the IntergovernmentalRisk Management Act may be held by telephone conference call if:(a) The territory represented by the educational service unit or member public agenciesof the entity or pool covers more than one county;(b) Reasonable advance publicized notice is given which identifieseach telephone conference location at which aneducational service unit board member or a member of the entity'sor pool's governing body will be present;(c) All telephone conference meeting sites identified in thenotice are located within public buildings used by members of the educational service unit board or entityor pool or at a place which will accommodate the anticipated audience;(d) Reasonable arrangements are made to accommodate the public'sright to attend, hear, and speak at the meeting, including seating, recordationby audio recording devices, and a reasonable opportunity for input such aspublic comment or questions to at least the same extent as would be providedif a telephone conference call was not used;(e) At least one copy of all documents being considered isavailable to the public at each site of the telephone conference call;(f) At least one member of the educational service unit board or governingbody of the entity or pool is present at each site of the telephone conferencecall identified in the public notice;(g) The telephone conference call lasts no more than one hour;and(h) No more than one-half of the board's, entity's, or pool's meetings in a calendar year areheld by telephone conference call,except that a governing body of a risk management pool that meets at leastquarterly and the advisory committees of the governing body may each holdmore than one-half of its meetings by telephone conference call if the governingbody's quarterly meetings are not held by telephone conference call or videoconferencing.Nothing in this subsection shall prevent the participationof consultants, members of the press, and other nonmembers of the governingbody at sites not identified in the public notice. Telephone conference calls,emails, faxes, or other electronic communication shall not be used to circumventany of the public government purposes established in the Open Meetings Act.(4) The secretary or other designee of each public body shallmaintain a list of the news media requesting notification of meetings andshall make reasonable efforts to provide advance notification to them of thetime and place of each meeting and the subjects to be discussed at that meeting.(5) When it is necessary to hold an emergency meeting withoutreasonable advance public notice, the nature of the emergency shall be statedin the minutes and any formal action taken in such meeting shall pertain onlyto the emergency. Such emergency meetings may be held by means of electronicor telecommunication equipment. The provisions of subsection (4) of this sectionshall be complied with in conducting emergency meetings. Complete minutesof such emergency meetings specifying the nature of the emergency and anyformal action taken at the meeting shall be made available to the public byno later than the end of the next regular business day.(6) A public body may allow a member of the public or anyother witness other than a member of the public body to appear before thepublic body by means of video or telecommunications equipment. SourceLaws 1975, LB 325, § 4; Laws 1983, LB 43, § 3; Laws 1987, LB 663, § 25; Laws 1993, LB 635, § 2; Laws 1996, LB 469, § 6; Laws 1996, LB 1161, § 1; Laws 1999, LB 47, § 2; Laws 1999, LB 87, § 100; Laws 1999, LB 461, § 1; Laws 2000, LB 968, § 85; Laws 2004, LB 821, § 38; Laws 2004, LB 1179, § 2; Laws 2006, LB 898, § 2; Laws 2007, LB199, § 9; Laws 2009, LB361, § 2. Cross ReferencesIntergovernmental Risk Management Act, see section 44-4301.Interlocal Cooperation Act, see section 13-801.Joint Public Agency Act, see section 13-2501.Municipal Cooperative Financing Act, see section 18-2401. AnnotationsUnder subsection (1) of this section, the Legislature has imposed only two conditions on the public body's notification method of a public meeting: (1) It must give reasonable advance publicized notice of the time and place of each meeting and (2) it must be recorded in the public body's minutes. City of Elkhorn v. City of Omaha, 272 Neb. 867, 725 N.W.2d 792 (2007).An emergency is "(a)ny event or occasional combination of circumstances which calls for immediate action or remedy; pressing necessity; exigency; a sudden or unexpected happening; an unforeseen occurrence or condition." Steenblock v. Elkhorn Township Bd., 245 Neb. 722, 515 N.W.2d 128 (1994).An agenda which gives reasonable notice of the matters to be considered at a meeting of a city council complies with the requirements of this section. Pokorny v. City of Schuyler, 202 Neb. 334, 275 N.W.2d 281 (1979).When notice is required, a notice of a special meeting of a city council posted in three public places at 10:00 p.m. on the day preceding the meeting is not reasonable advance publicized notice of a meeting as is required by this section. Pokorny v. City of Schuyler, 202 Neb. 334, 275 N.W.2d 281 (1979).Teacher waived right to object to lack of public notice in board of education employment hearing by voluntary participation in the hearing without objection. Alexander v. School Dist. No. 17, 197 Neb. 251, 248 N.W.2d 335 (1976).An agenda notice which merely stated "work order reports" was an inadequate notice under this section because it did not give interested persons knowledge that plans for a 345 kv transmission line through the district was going to be discussed and voted upon at the meeting. Inadequate agenda notice under this section meant there was a substantial violation of the public meeting laws; however, later actions by the board of directors cured the defects in notice, and such actions were in substantial compliance with the statute. Hansmeyer v. Nebraska Pub. Power Dist., 6 Neb. App. 889, 578 N.W.2d 476 (1998).
