FAMU trustees may have skirted Sunshine Law

As Rattler Nation wrote on Wednesday, secretive efforts to coordinate a potential vote of the FAMU Board of Trustees preceded the publicly noticed teleconference that took place on that date. The reported conversations between certain board members could very well have violated Florida’s Government-in-the-Sunshine Law.

State law generally prohibits two or more members from specific elected or appointed bodies from communicating about issues that could come before the group unless it is at an announced, public meeting. The group must also keep a record of what happened at those meetings.

The FAMU Board of Trustees, and all the other boards within the State University System of Florida, are required to follow the Sunshine Law.

Recent news revelations that some trustees might talked among each other before Wednesday's teleconference meeting to plan a vote to oust FAMU President James H. Ammons are a clear indication that one or more trustees very likely engaged in conversations on an issue that the could have come before the board. The Sunshine Law was created to require public officials to only have such conversations at public meetings .