The Friends of White’s Woods are accusing White Township Supervisors of violating the Sunshine Act by holding their March 24th meeting after they were not able to live stream the meeting on the internet as promised.
Township Manager Milt Lady said that right before the meeting started, the internet service to the township building went out, and they were not able to connect to the GoToMeeting application they have been using to stream the meetings online since the start of the pandemic. Multiple attempts were made to connect to the GoToMeeting app, but they were all unsuccessful. The township decided to go on with the meeting rather than cancel it.
The letter from the board of directors of Friends of White’s Woods said that about 10 people were admitted to the virtual waiting room for the meeting, and then entered the virtual meeting room, but the township’s feed was not there. As the township building was still closed to the public, the Friends of White’s Woods believe that people who were legally trying to access the meeting were denied their right to take part in the meeting, and that prior precedence shows that denial of virtual access to a meeting as a result of technical problems is a violation of the Sunshine Act.
The group is asking for a do-over of the March 24th meeting and a recording of that night’s meeting be released.
Township Manager Milt Lady said he received the letter, and the accusations are being examined.
He says that there are no plans to have a re-do of the meeting, but he would be open to having the action items from the March 24th meeting be brought up again during their meeting on April 14th. He also said that a scheduled speaker for that meeting has rescheduled to speak on the 14th. The meeting on the 14th is set to be open to a limited in-person audience.
