Closed meetings and non-disclosure agreements for Lancaster County Jail Board | Local News

Austin Beiler, Lancaster Airport Authority operations manager and West Lampeter Township resident, is beginning his third year as a member of the Lancaster County Prison Advisory Committee, a panel whose work is entering a critical final year of planning — groundbreaking on the largest capital project in county history could occur before the end of 2025.

As a “community member” of the 22-member advisory committee, Beiler represents his family and neighbors who live near the new prison site in Lancaster Township. But his work on the committee remains largely unknown to his community and the general public.

This is because the advisory committee's meetings and deliberations are not held in public. And discussion of the new prison project could be a violation of a confidentiality agreement he signed with the county, he said.

“In my opinion, it partially defeated the purpose of my role,” Beiler said of the agreement.

Since concrete steps toward building a new jail began in 2022, county officials have been pushing for a public process in which residents are invited to comment and ask questions at hearings and regular public meetings on the project's progress.

But legal experts said the use of nondisclosure agreements and closed-door planning meetings pose a threat to government transparency. In addition, lawyers familiar with open meeting laws said the advisory committee may be subject to Pennsylvania's Sunshine Act and that the nondisclosure agreements signed by Beiler and other committee members could potentially violate their First Amendment rights.

LNP | LancasterOnline obtained copies of the non-disclosure agreements through a public records request.

In an emailed statement, Michael Fitzpatrick, a spokesman for the county commissioners, said the advisory committee's work was completely impeccable and the public had the opportunity to comment on and influence every decision the commissioners made.

The advisory committee “is an administrative working group that collects data and information and implements directives given by the Board of Supervisors and the Prison Council in public meetings,” Fitzpatrick wrote. “As previously stated, this group has no authority to make decisions or recommendations on the project. All deliberations and decisions take place in public meetings.”

Melissa Melewsky, media law counsel for the Pennsylvania NewsMedia Association, said she believes the law is clear: A committee empowered by elected officials to advise on new policies and influence future decisions must follow the state's Sunshine Act.

The Public Meetings Act is intended to ensure that the public has the right to observe and participate in government agencies' planning processes, and not just to have a say in the final product, Melewsky said.

Last year, consultants hired by the county and members of the advisory committee collaborated on a detailed 136-page report outlining what operations and programs could be included in the new jail. The report, compiled largely in private sessions, cites only one directive from the commissioners — the jail should have a capacity of 1,000 beds.

One of the consultants, Chloe Jaco, compared the report to a “recipe” that the planners of the new prison “will take and turn into a concept.”

The report outlined the extensive process that led to its findings – nine separate meetings that included “an overview of the vision for the facility, project objectives, a description of the current facility and operating status, a review of trends and benchmarks, and a discussion of the desired future operating status and associated space needs.”

Commissioners voted in February to adopt a final version of the report.

“The law recognizes that when you exclude the public from committee processes, you also exclude them from the policy-making and decision-making process, which runs counter to democratic government,” Melewsky said.

Liz Wagenseller, executive director of the Office of Open Records, said there aren't many previous legal cases that have tested the limits of the Sunshine Act, even though the law's language is clear.

“The Sunshine Act is clear, but at the same time it is not clear,” Wagenseller said.

A powerful law

The Sunshine Act requires elected officials and government agencies to provide notice of scheduled meeting dates, publish meeting agendas at least 24 hours in advance, allow the public to record meetings, and maintain meeting minutes, to name a few.

The law also provides exceptions to what must be discussed in public. Some matters, such as real estate transactions, employment negotiations, confidential personal information and public safety issues, may be restricted to private discussions.

However, the Open Meetings Act requires officials to announce these private “executive meetings” and provide a description of the general topics discussed, Melewsky said.

The Sunshine Act makes an important distinction between work that must be done publicly and work that can be done behind closed doors, experts say.

The law distinguishes between “administrative actions” and “consultations”, which must be public.

J. Dwight Yoder, an attorney with the Lancaster law firm Gibbel Kraybill & Hess LLP, said administrative actions generally are things that do not require further policy decisions by elected officials.

“This is more about the practical aspects of governance, as opposed to a committee that actually deals with policymaking and budget decisions,” said Yoder, who is not related to Commissioner Alice Yoder.

The law itself describes an administrative action as follows: “The execution of policies with respect to persons or things previously authorized or required by an official action of the authority adopted in a public meeting of the authority.”

A consultation, on the other hand, is the “discussion of matters of an authority for the purpose of decision-making.” The law states that the discussion must be public.

Supporters want focus on reforms

Local stakeholders who have closely followed the county's process for developing the new jail said they wish there had been more open public discussion, but most of their concerns focused on the county's criminal justice system as a whole rather than the new jail itself.

The Rev. Jason Perkowski of Faith United Methodist Church in Lititz was among a group of advocates calling for the creation of a new committee to look at the county's criminal justice system and find strategies to reduce the county's local jail population.

“They were all great,” Perkowski said of the county's public meetings on the prison proposals, “but it's not a serious enough dialogue.”

Michelle Batt, a former Lancaster County public defender and local criminal justice reform advocate, said she believes commissioners should involve the public more, but that the process should include the practices of the justice system, not just the new jail's construction plans.

“We know we need a new facility, but we also need sustainable practices,” said Batt.

Commissioners Parsons and D'Agostino, as well as Chief Judge David Ashworth, have said the board of commissioners has no control over the conduct of court hearings and the rules of criminal law. “I have stated many times that if any of these groups want to make changes in the court system, they should direct their efforts to the Legislature,” Ashworth wrote in an email in May.