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About Deborah Fisher

Deborah Fisher has been executive director of Tennessee Coalition for Open Government since 2013. Previously she spent 25 years in the news industry as a journalist.
21 Apr, 2025

‘Advisory board’ that would oversee Memphis school board would be exempt from Open Meetings Act

By |2025-04-21T14:33:37-05:00April 21, 2025|Categories: Legislature, Open Meetings, school boards|Tags: , , |0 Comments

A Senate bill up for a vote today that creates a board of managers to oversee the Memphis Shelby County School District would allow the new board to operate secretly. The bill specifically states the the new board of managers would be exempt from the Open Meetings Act and could hold meetings closed to the public. The board would have significant powers, including recommending elected school board members for removal. The House version also creates a new board, which slightly different powers, but in this bill, the new board would be subject to the Open Meetings law.

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3 Apr, 2025

Metro Nashville Police release report on Covenant School shooting

By |2025-04-04T13:49:54-05:00April 3, 2025|Categories: crime records, public records lawsuits Tennessee|Tags: , , , |0 Comments

More than two years after a shooter blasted into the Covenant School in Nashville and killed six people, including three third-graders, the Metro Nashville Police Department on April 2 released a 48-page investigative case summary officially announcing the end of the case. Records of shooter's writings collected by police continue to be part of a lawsuit on appeal at the Court of Appeals in which a chancellor ruled copyright prevented their release.

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24 Mar, 2025

Comptroller’s Report: DA’s Conference has been violating Open Meetings law

By |2025-03-24T15:31:46-05:00March 24, 2025|Categories: adequate public notice, Legislature, minutes, Open Meetings|Tags: , , |0 Comments

Just days after the District Attorneys General Conference pushed a bill through committee to exempt many of their meetings from the Open Meetings Act, a Comptroller's audit of the DA's General Conference was released that found that the conference and its committees have largely been violating the open meetings act. The Open Meetings Act requires governing bodies, including governing bodies created by the Legislature, such as the district attorney general's conference, to give adequate public notice of meetings and record and maintain minutes. However, the DA's Conference gave public notice for only a handful of its meetings from 2021 to 2023. For example, its executive committee met 30 times but [...]

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17 Mar, 2025

Public university payments to student athletes to be confidential under proposed bill

By |2025-03-17T11:31:35-05:00March 17, 2025|Categories: Legislature, public university records|0 Comments

The Knoxville News Sentinel reports on proposed legislation that will allow public universities in Tennessee to keep confidential money paid to student athletes as part of potential new revenue sharing deals. The bill requires total annualized aggregated amounts to be available, but no specific individual payments.

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17 Mar, 2025

Citizens should have access to clear agendas for all government body meetings

By |2025-03-17T10:51:52-05:00March 17, 2025|Categories: Legislature, meeting agenda, Open Meetings|Tags: , , |0 Comments

The Tennessee Legislature first passed the "agenda requirement" within the Open Meetings Act in 2023. But it applied only to city and county legislative bodies, such as city councils and county commissions. In 2024, the Legislature expanded the agenda requirement to cover state boards and commissions. This year, the Legislature has a chance to complete the sound advance toward transparency in government and require that all governing bodies that are subject to the Open Meetings Act have an agenda that is available to the public before the meeting.

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