New York state's top expert on government transparency said the Auburn Enlarged City School District may have violated the state Open Meetings law when the board of education convened an executive session this week.

During a special board meeting held Wednesday to officiate the results of the budget vote held the day before, the board voted to go into executive session, with Superintendent J.D. Pabis, citing personnel, contracts and pending legal action as items to be discussed behind closed doors.

The executive session lasted more than an hour. Once the board returned to open session, Pabis explained that possible reductions in staff were discussed in executive session.

“A lot of the things we are dealing with - the card you received, the brochure you received, the talking points that the media, that we always discussed - dealt with personnel issues and the possibility that there might be cuts in personnel,” he said Wednesday. “That was one of the items plus two other items that had us move into executive session.”

But that's not only what went on in the session, board member Joe Leogrande said.

He said Pabis distributed a list of items that are subject to funding reductions - summer curriculum work, professional development, equipment, etc. - and after the discussion, collected them all back from the members of the board.

“I said to myself, ‘This is equipment,'” Leogrande said Thursday.

Pabis indicated that any reduction in staff would be related to necessary funding cuts to adhere to a state-mandated contingency budget as voters twice defeated the proposed 2008-09 budget of $66,490,371.

But the discussion of layoffs behind closed doors may have violated the state's Open Meetings law, Executive Director of the Committee on Open Government Bob Freeman said. The committee is a state agency embedded within the State Department of New York State.

“As a general matter, when the board is discussing issues involving the budget and layoffs, the matter involves money and positions,” he said. “In that circumstance, in my opinion, there is no basis for conducting an executive session. Judicial precedent indicates that a discussion of layoffs due to budgetary concerns does not constitute a proper subject for consideration in executive session.”

While the word “personnel” is employed often to enter in executive session, he said the word does not appear anywhere in the Open Meetings law. However, an executive session can be called to discuss matters involving a particular person. Those exceptions include “the medical, financial, credit or employment history or a particular person or corporation,” the law reads, “or matters leading to the appointment, employment, promotion, demotion, discipline, suspension, dismissal or removal of a particular person or corporation.”

Pabis repeated Thursday the three items on the agenda for the executive session: personnel, contracts and pending legal action.

“What I am telling you are the three items that were discussed in executive session,” he said.

He said he did not disclose the names of people whose positions may be eliminated to the board as it “may get back to personnel in a particular bargaining unit.” He maintained that personnel issues were the crux of the executive session.

“I didn't vote to going into executive session,” Leogrande said, explaining he arrived after that vote was held. “I wasn't there, I'm sorry to say.”

Staff writer Alyssa Sunkin can be reached at 253-5311 ext. 239 or alyssa.sunkin@lee.net