The Supreme Court, in a split decision, found that the entire hearing should have been conducted publicly, therefore invalidating her termination and sending the matter back to the village council, which will have to conduct hearings following open meeting laws.
According to the decision, Barga was police chief from February 2018 to November 2020 when Mayor Brenda Cook placed her on administrative leave, which she said was due to Barga’s refusal to take direction from the mayor and otherwise failing to properly perform her duties. Barga denied misconduct and accused the mayor of belittling and harassing her.
Barga appealed the village council’s firing decision to the common pleas court, on the basis that the Open Meetings Act would prevent them from deliberating in an executive session after she had requested a public meeting. That court affirmed the village council’s decision, as did the Second District Court of Appeals.
Justice R. Patrick DeWine wrote in his majority opinion for the Ohio Supreme Court that public bodies may discuss some issues like termination in private unless a public employee requests a public hearing. If that request is made, he wrote, the entire process must be public.
“Here, Barga requested a public hearing. Yet the village council chose to consider the charges against her in private. In doing so, it violated the plain terms of [the Open Meetings Act],” DeWine wrote.
According to the decision, “the plain language of the Open Meetings Act would seem to make this an easy case,” with the law stating that it “shall be liberally construed to require public officials to take official action and to conduct all deliberations upon official business only in open meetings unless the subject matter is specifically exempted by law.”
The act also says that members of a public body can have an executive session related to a public employee’s discipline, appointment, employment, promotion, dismissal, demotion or compensation unless that employee requests a public meeting.
" ... The exception in the Open Meetings Act to hold an executive session does not apply here, because Barga requested a public hearing,” the decision states.
Justice Jennifer Brunner wrote in a dissenting opinion that the law does not say that that chief can request the discussion of her termination be public. Brunner wrote this means that the village council was allowed to deliberate in private.
Barga could not be reached for comment.
About the Author
