Montgomery County Council Violated Open Meetings Act: We find that the Council violated § 3-305(d) by failing, in several written-closing statements, to disclose all necessary details.
County Council violated the Open Meetings Act when they convened in Closed Sessions to set the process for filling the vacancy created by Councilmember Gabe Albornoz' resignation in the fall of 2025.
WTOP: Montgomery Co. Council member Gabe Albornoz to step down in December
How was the process for filling this vacant County Council seat decided?
It was decided behind closed doors.
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The Complainant alleges that the Montgomery County Council (the “Council”) violated the Open Meetings Act (the “Act”) by improperly invoking the administrative function exclusion to convene in closed session, by failing to comply with the Act’s requirements for written closing statements, by taking four months to approve a set of minutes, and by failing to post minutes online. For the reasons below, we cannot determine whether the Council violated the Act by discussing a matter in closed session that exceeded the bounds of the administrative function exclusion. We do, however, find that the Council violated the Act by failing, in several written closing statements, to disclose all the details required by the Act…
…The Council asserts that the October 7 closed session involved a discussion about an upcoming vacancy on the body and the Council’s obligation to fill that vacancy under County law…
…The Complainant, however, asserts that, “rather than simply administering existing law, the Council presumably met to decide policy regarding the timing and process for appointing a person to fill [the] Council vacancy.” She alleges, “[b]ased on subsequent information released by the Council,” that the October 7 closed session must have involved discussions about the timeline for candidates to apply, the Council’s decision to consider only applicants who pledged not to run for office in 2026, requiring candidates to file a confidential financial disclosure to the Council clerk, when to interview candidates, and what information about the candidates to withhold from the public…
…We can say, however, that the discussion did not fall within the personnel matters exception of § 3-305(b)(1), which the Council also invoked for excluding the public from this discussion…
…Conclusion
We cannot determine whether the Council violated the openness requirement of § 3-301 by convening in closed session on October 7, 2025; although the topic of discussion exceeded the bounds of the personnel matters exception, it is not clear from the closed session minutes whether the discussion stayed within the scope of the administrative function exclusion. We find that the Council violated § 3-305(d) by failing, in several written-closing statements, to disclose all necessary details. We do not, however, find that the Council violated the Act by taking four months to approve the May 14 closed-session minutes. We also find no violation with respect to posting minutes online, though we encourage the Council to consider the Complainant’s suggestions for making minutes easier to find.
Full text of the Open Meetings Act Compliance Board’s Opinion is at the link below:
https://oag.maryland.gov/resources-info/Documents/pdfs/OMCB%20Opinions/20OMCB52.pdf