MILLSTONE — Members of the Millstone Township K-8 School District Board of Education have received a refresher course in the use of email in their official capacity as elected officials.
Attorney Bruce Padula, who represents the board, discussed the topic at a recent meeting of the board.
“My recommendation is this: Don’t end up like Hillary Clinton. Use your official board email,” Padula said. “Why make an issue if you don’t need one? Any emails you send or receive are public records under the state’s Open Public Records Act (OPRA).”
Padula was referring to Clinton’s use of a private email account during her service as the U.S. Secretary of State. Clinton has announced she is a candidate for president in the 2016 election.
Referring to the school board, Padula said the Sunshine Law, or the Open Public Meetings Act, can be invoked in situations involving email to everyone on the board.
“So, you want to be careful with that,” he cautioned the board members.
Padula explained how emails may be used. As an example, he said he received a memorandum from a county prosecutor regarding the establishment of rules and procedures relating to the use of email.
“My rule and what I counsel my clients to do is to use [email] for information only,” he said, referring to the board.
As an example of properly using email for informational purposes, Padula said if Superintendent of Schools Scott Feder sent an email regarding a meeting date change, it could go out to the entire board.
However, Padula cautioned that board members who might respond to Feder’s email by sending their response to “all,” might be creating an issue.
“The Open Public Meetings Act talks about meeting in person or by other electronic means,” Padula said. “Obviously when it was written, it did not contemplate email, but it was written at a time when there were telephone conferences, so that is what it envisioned and it has been applied to email conversations before.”
Padula cited a 2006 case that involved email. He said the mayor of a community in Bergen County was using a personal email account for municipal business. The mayor claimed the emails were personal, but was unsuccessful in the argument because the email messages discussed municipal business and were subject to OPRA, according to the attorney.
One board member asked Padula to clarify the issue of copying the whole board in an email.
“No, I would not copy the whole board,” the attorney advised.
As an example, he said he received an email from a board member who copied the entire board on the original message.
“I had an opinion on the response, so I took all the board members’ names off and emailed it back to the superintendent, the person who wrote the email, and the president and vice president of the board,” Padula said. “I did not want to violate the Open Public Meetings Act, but I felt it was important to respond. But I did respond to the people in positions to make a decision.”
The discussion among the attorney and the board members also touched on ethics.
“You have to [discuss ethics] because school boards have their own regulating body, the School Ethics Commission. Anyone can file a complaint against a board member at any time, and the commission will investigate it,” Padula said. “They have so much power that they can throw you — an elected official — off the board if there is an egregious enough violation or a repeat violation of the laws that govern your conduct as school board members.”
He said two laws govern the conduct of board members: the School Ethics Act and the Code of Conduct for school board members. To summarize, Padula said there are two principles regarding ethics: conflict of interest and chain of command.