Last month, as we noted, the all-Republican Loudoun Board of Supervisors, in another of its unrelenting efforts to make it as difficult as possible for the public to find out what they’re up to or what stupid things they have said in the process, voted unanimously to abolish written minutes of their meetings, effective this coming January.
State law requires local bodies to keep and publish minutes which, among other things must provide “a summary of the discussion on matters proposed, deliberated or decided, and a record of any votes taken.”
The Board, however, airily argued that the extremely convenient webcasts of its meetings that it posts online are the equivalent of such a “summary” — about like arguing that to find out the standing of your baseball team, all you need to do is watch a video of all of the games they have played so far this year.
Having provoked an understandably concerned reaction from citizens, Supervisor Matt Letourneau (R-Dulles) posted on his Facebook page a huffy denial that the Board had abolished written minutes: sounding exactly like the doubletalking bureaucratic phrase-dropping permanent undersecretary Sir Humphrey in the British TV political satire series “Yes, Minister,” Letourneau explained that the Board had merely “streamlined some sections of the minutes” and taken advantage of “new technology” to “revise the format” of the minutes.
He also blamed Democrats for this “misinformation.”
However . . . if you actually read the details of the . . errr minutes, you’ll find that what the Board did was to . . . eliminate written minutes.
Next: expect Letourneau to blame the media.
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