Andy Rogers is a senior managing editor for the Sun Sailor and Sun Post.
It’s a cliché every election cycle.
“I will increase transparency.”
Candidates challenging incumbents for a seat on the city council or school board routinely stump on the promise of being more transparent. It’s hard to argue with, and it subtly implies the current body has something to hide.
But like many campaign promises, it’s vague and undefined. Given how many candidates run on this platform, our local government bodies should be almost see-through by now.
If a candidate knocks on your door this fall pledging transparency, ask them what that actually looks like in practice.
See if they would vote to record and stream every meeting where a quorum is present.
Almost every city council and school board broadcasts its regular meetings, which are the formal sessions where binding votes are cast. But governing bodies also hold discussion-focused work sessions and study sessions — often before or after regular meetings, or on different nights altogether.
These informal gatherings are where the real work happens, where members ask hard questions, and where majority consensus forms.
During the pandemic, these meetings moved online out of necessity. Today, however, some local bodies are rolling back those practices either by turning off the cameras for work sessions or by relying on audio-only feeds or wide-angle lenses that make discussions hard to follow.
The common defense? Board members argue that off-camera discussions allow them to debate freely without worrying about asking “dumb” questions or floating unrefined ideas. They fear being caught in a gotcha moment.
But that’s not very transparent of them.
Work sessions and study sessions are open to the public by law. If a quorum of elected officials is discussing public business, make it easy for the public to watch. Video archives allow residents to see the nuances of decision making. It may even lead to shorter public comment periods if constituents have a better understanding of what goes into a decision.
Measured against this standard, here is how local entities stack up:
St. Louis Park City Council: Regular meetings are streamed and recorded, but study sessions are not broadcast live, leaving residents to request audio archives or search meeting records. St. Louis Park School Board: Regular meetings are live-streamed and archived. Study sessions are streamed live, but archives are not published afterward giving viewers only one chance to watch. Excelsior City Council: Both regular meetings and work sessions are recorded and reposted within a few days. Good job! Wayzata City Council: Regular meetings are recorded, but its work sessions are not. Wayzata School Board: Both regular meetings and study sessions are recorded, earning them a high mark for transparency. Edina City Council: The regular meetings are streamed and recorded, but the work sessions feature audio only, making it difficult to follow the discussion or identify who is speaking. Bloomington City Council: Records and streams study sessions, regular meetings, and much more. Five stars. Richfield: The city streams and records nearly everything, though study sessions are audio-only. Hopkins City Council: Regular meetings are streamed and uploaded the next day, but work sessions are not recorded. An audio-only download is provided, though camera movement and persistent microphone issues frequently degrade stream quality. Hopkins School Board: Both regular meetings and work sessions are live-streamed on YouTube and archived instantly for easy public access. Plymouth City Council: Regular meetings are recorded and uploaded the following day, but work sessions are off camera. It could be better. Eden Prairie City Council: Regular meetings are broadcast across multiple platforms using a multi-camera setup, but work sessions are not recorded. Eden Prairie School Board: Regular meetings are recorded using a static camera and published to YouTube. Work sessions are unrecorded, and older archives return broken links. Minnetonka City Council: Regular meetings are televised live and posted on-demand within 24 hours. Study sessions are recorded with audio only, leaving viewers without a visual feed. Minnetonka School Board: Regular meetings and study sessions are both recorded and archived online the following day, though the use of a single fixed camera makes it difficult to identify speakers. Shorewood City Council: Regular meetings are live-streamed with a remote Zoom option, but work sessions are held in-person only and off-camera, requiring residents to rely on posted meeting minutes after the fact.Brooklyn Park City Council: Regular and special meetings are live-streamed and archived. Work sessions lack a video component and are not live-streamed; audio recordings are posted online after the meeting has concluded, sometimes days later.Brooklyn Center City Council: Regular meetings are broadcast live on cable and archived online. Work sessions held prior to or after regular sessions can be attended live via Zoom and are recorded for later viewing.Osseo School Board: Regular business meetings are live-streamed and fully archived on YouTube, but work sessions are audio-recorded only.Brooklyn Center School District (ISD 286): Regular business meetings are recorded and uploaded, but informal work sessions and study sessions are not.
For candidates and incumbents anxious about having unfiltered questions broadcast on repeat: remember that public office is inherently public.
Under state law, government data is presumed public unless a specific statute classifies it as private. Anyone can request an elected official’s email, and written correspondence regarding public business is open to public inspection. If the public already has the right to check your email, hiding your spoken discussion behind unrecorded doors makes little sense.
Being transparent is choice. Recording every work session is a good place to start.