Compliance & security
The part that has to be right.
This service exists because the paperwork carries legal consequences. So here is exactly what the law asks for, and exactly how we handle it — the deadlines, the records, the recordings and the boundaries.
A worked example
What Arizona requires, in full
Every state has an open meeting law and a records retention schedule, and no two are identical. Arizona is set out below in full detail, because it is where we started and where we are deepest — and because it shows the level we work at. We build the same thing to your state’s statute and your state’s retention schedule.
Arizona’s open meeting law sets out what has to be posted, when, and what a set of minutes has to contain. None of it is complicated. All of it is dated.
| The requirement | In law, and in practice |
|---|---|
| Notice and agenda | Notice and agenda posted at least 24 hours before a meeting (A.R.S. § 38-431.02). We work to 72 hours as the practical standard, because that is the window where a member of the public may need an accommodation. |
| Minutes posted | Minutes or a recording open for public inspection no later than three working days after the meeting (A.R.S. § 38-431.01). |
| What minutes contain | Date, time and place; members recorded present or absent; a general description of the matters considered; and an accurate description of every legal action proposed, discussed or taken, including how each member voted, and the names of members who proposed and seconded. |
| Executive sessions | Cited to the exact numbered paragraph of A.R.S. § 38-431.03(A) that authorizes them — not to the section in general. |
| Retention | Records retained to the Arizona State Library (ASLAPR) general retention schedule — minutes permanent, meeting recordings three months. |
Why it matters
Action taken at a meeting that was not properly noticed can be declared null and void, and civil penalties for knowing violations are assessed against board members personally and may not be reimbursed by the district (A.R.S. §§ 38-431.05, 38-431.07). That is the reason for the deadline discipline: the exposure sits with the people who volunteered for the board.
Your state
Same shape everywhere. Different numbers.
There are 39,555 special district governments in the United States, and all fifty states and the District of Columbia have an open meeting or sunshine law — every state had adopted one by 1976. There is no national standard, so the requirements vary state to state. What does hold almost everywhere is the shape of the obligation.
Posted some minimum time ahead of the meeting.
Open to the public within some window afterwards.
Justified by a specific statutory exemption.
Kept on a published retention schedule.
The numbers behind each of those — how many hours of notice, how many days to the minutes, which paragraph authorizes a closed session, how long a recording is kept — differ by state. We do not guess at them and we do not carry them over from somewhere else.
What we establish before your first meeting
The notice period, the minutes deadline, the content the minutes must carry, and the exemptions that authorize a closed session — taken from your state’s own statute.
How long each record has to be kept, and what happens to a meeting recording, taken from the schedule your state publishes.
Where a board’s own rules are stricter than the statute, the stricter rule governs the calendar.
Meeting dates, post-by dates and filing dates for the year, confirmed with your officer of record before we work on a single meeting.
District count: U.S. Census Bureau, 2022 Census of Governments. We set out specific deadlines, citations and retention periods only for a state we have read for a district we are working with; anything contested still goes to the district’s attorney.
The question every board asks
Is a recording really enough?
It is a fair question, and it is worth answering properly, because the worry behind it is usually about accuracy rather than about the law.
The minutes do not need to be a verbatim transcript of the meeting.
Arizona does not ask for a transcript. The handbook goes on to say that minutes must summarize the discussion, including the topics addressed, and identify all speakers who participated. Your own state will have its own language on what a set of minutes must contain, and we read it — but the standard is not catching every word. It is getting the motions, the seconds and the votes exactly right — and those are the parts a recording captures best, because they are said slowly, on purpose, and usually repeated back by the chair.
Three ways to capture a meeting
A phone on the table
For a small board meeting in one room, a phone set down in the middle of the table is genuinely enough. Nothing to buy, nothing to set up.
A conference recorder we supply
If the room is difficult — a long table, hard floors, a public that speaks from the back — we supply a conference recorder and set it up, at no charge.
The platform recording
For a virtual or hybrid meeting, the platform recording and automatic transcript from Google Meet or Zoom come across exactly as they are.
How accuracy is assured
A person writes the minutes
Someone listens to the meeting and drafts the record. Software never drafts a record on its own.
Speakers are identified, not guessed
Speakers are identified from the roll call and from the chair naming who moved and who seconded.
Anything unclear is flagged
Anything unclear is flagged in the draft with a timestamp for the district’s officer to confirm — never guessed at, and never filled in.
The signature makes it the record
The officer’s signature is what makes it the record. Nothing posts before that.
Records & data
How your records and data are handled
The district’s record is the district’s property. Everything below follows from that one point.
The district owns everything
Records live in a Google Workspace folder in the district’s name. If the relationship ends, the district keeps the folder, the files and the website content. There is no export fee.
Named-person access only
Access is granted by name, to whoever the board designates, with two-factor authentication on every account. No shared logins.
Executive session material stays separate
Executive session material is handled separately from the public record, and it is never posted.
Recordings are deleted on schedule
Meeting recordings are deleted at the end of the state’s three-month retention window. The minutes are what lasts.
Never used for anything else
A district’s material is used for that district and nothing else — not for another client, not for a sample, not for anything we publish.
Accessibility
Accessibility is a compliance issue, not a design preference
District sites carry public notices. A notice a resident cannot read is not notice, which is why accessibility belongs with the statute rather than with the styling.
Every site we build and manage is built this way from the start, and it sits inside the monthly fee rather than arriving later as a separate line item.
What that means in the build
- Semantic structure — headings, lists and landmarks that describe the page rather than decorate it
- Correct heading order, so the page can be navigated by keyboard and screen reader
- Labelled form fields, every one of them
- Visible focus states on every link, button and field
- Text contrast meeting WCAG AA
Where we stop
Where our responsibility ends
The boundaries do not move, and they are the same on every engagement.
The district’s officer of record adopts, signs, posts and files. We prepare the documents behind them.
We never hold public funds. Documents, never dollars.
Administrative document preparation, not legal advice. Contested matters go to the district’s attorney.
District elections run through the county. They are never ours.
The Board Secretary provides administrative document preparation and board-secretary support. It does not provide legal advice, hold public funds, or serve as a statutory officer; contested matters are referred to the district’s attorney.
Start here
A call first. Then a free month.
Thirty minutes with both of us, free — bring any question the board is carrying. Nothing is sold on the call, and anything contested still goes to your district’s attorney. The free first month can be set up on the same call.