Ruling: Incline Village board violated law 15 times

The Nevada Attorney General’s Office has issued an opinion charging the Incline Village General Improvement Board and Audit Committee violated the open meeting law 15 times between December 2016 and November 2017.

The violations under the open meeting law all involve the board and committee’s failure to approve minutes from prior meetings within the statutory limit of 45 days after the meeting. Some of the approvals were more than 40 days beyond that deadline. The complaint was filed by Aaron Katz of Incline Village.

By law, minutes of public body meetings must be made available for public inspection within 30 days after the meeting and approved within 45 days.

The opinion by Senior Deputy AG John Michela states in most of those cases, the board held meetings within the timeframe but failed to consider minutes of prior meetings.

He granted the board exceptions in three other cases including one where a power outage canceled the meeting.

“Based on the findings of fact and legal standard and conclusions of law as set out above, the OAG (Office of the Attorney General) finds the board and committee failed to approve minutes as required by (Nevada statute) 15 times,” the opinion states.

It added, however, there were no complaints the minutes were unavailable for public inspection or there were other violations.

It directs the IVGID board to put the opinion on the agenda for its next meeting and acknowledge the findings.