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School board decision nullified following records request

It was the conversation that wasn’t when the board reconvened following an executive session held during the Archuleta School District (ASD) Board of Education regular meeting on April 10.
On the agenda for the meeting, was “Superintendent Evaluation and Contract Negotiation,” stating that the BOE would be entering executive session “pursuant to C.R.S. 24-6-402(4)(f) to continue the Superintendent’s evaluation and to discuss a potential contract addendum.”
Colorado Revised Statutes (C.R.S.) 24-6-402(4)(f) allows a local public body to enter into an executive session for the purposes of discussing “Personnel matters except if the employee who is the subject of the session has requested an open meeting, or if the personnel matter involves more than one employee, all of the employees have requested an open meeting.”
During the April 10 board meeting, BOE member Brooks Lindner made a motion to enter into executive session.
“Mr. President, I move that we go into executive session pursuant to C.R.S. 24-6-402(4)(f) to continue the superintendent’s evaluation and to discuss a potential contract addendum,” Lindner said, addressing board president Greg Schick.
Following a unanimous vote, the board then moved to an executive session.
Reconvening the meeting back into public session, Schick explained that while no decisions had been made during the executive session regarding ASD Superintendent Linda Reed’s contract, there were discussions about an extension of two years to Reed’s contract.
However, no salary had been determined for Reed’s contract extension as ASD had not completed its budget process, Schick noted.
He then asked for a motion to that effect. Lindner made that motion, which passed unanimously.
C.R.S 24-6-402(4) states that “no adoption of any proposed policy, position, resolution, rule, regulation or formal action” except regarding executive session minutes, can be taken in executive session.
On April 16, The SUN requested the portion of the recording in which the BOE reconvened the meeting back into public session.
Statute states that, “Minutes of any meeting of a state public body shall be taken and promptly recorded, and such records shall be open to public inspection.”
ASD Executive Assistant Robyn Bennett wrote an email to The SUN indicating that she had conversations with ASD attorneys regarding the issue.
“I conferred with our attorney and because there was no official recording of the reconvening of the meeting the motion and vote are null and void. So, this item will be added to our next month’s school board agenda,” Bennett wrote.
Later, Bennett explained that the executive session had been recorded, just not the portion where the board reconvened the public session.
“They just stopped the recording at the end of the executive session and didn’t get the reconvening of the regular meeting recorded,” Bennett wrote.

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