The Seymour Board of Police Commissioners held what may have been an improper, closed-door meeting Wednesday to seek legal advice about an unspecified “personnel policy.”
The commissioners met at 5 p.m. Wednesday at the police department on Franklin Street.
The agenda, which was posted online and in town hall in advance of the meeting, called for an executive session on personnel issues.
Executive sessions are closed to the public and are allowed in certain circumstances under state law, such as when the discussion involves legal strategy, real estate deals or specific employees.
After the meeting, a reporter from the Valley Independent Sentinel asked commission vice chairman Frank Conroy whether the commissioners talked about a specific member of the police department.
Conroy said the discussion was about “general personnel policy.”
But under the Freedom of Information Act, public agencies are not permitted to discuss general policy issues in executive session, according to FOI Commission staff attorney Kathleen Ross.
“That’s exactly the kind of thing they need to discuss in public,” Ross said.
In addition to four members of the police commission, police Chief Michael Metzler, Lt. Paul Satkowski and town labor attorney Fran Teodosio were also in the executive session.
When reached Thursday, Teodosio would not discuss the specifics of the executive session, saying the discussion fell under attorney-client privilege. He said the commissioners had sought his legal opinion on an unspecified policy.
“They have a right to ask legal advice,” Teodosio said. “If they ask for legal advice, they have a right to do it in public, or they have a right to do it in private. If they do so in public, they waive the attorney-client privilege.”
Not so, according to the attorney for the state’s Freedom of Information Commission.
“We have interpreted that provision to be that there has to be a document,” Ross said. “There has to be an actual document that is exempt. You can not go into executive session and have your attorney there and just call it attorney-client privileged executive session.”
Teodosio said there was no written legal document being discussed during the meeting.
The police department has had several personnel issues in recent months.
Wednesday’s meeting was the first since Chief Michael Metzler suspended an officer without first notifying the Board of Police Commissioners.
Read background on that suspension here.
The police commission also has recently clashed with some members of the department over various other issues — including whether individual officers can talk to the media and whether evidence should be sent directly to the state forensics lab.