Lexington council can use secret work groups despite objections, Kentucky AG says
Kentucky Attorney General Russell Coleman’s office has ruled the Lexington council did not violate the state’s Open Meetings Act when it used work groups to craft policy.
That means the council can continue to use work groups — consisting of a few council members and sometimes staff — to draft policy behind closed doors with no public scrutiny.
In its April 17 opinion, the office, which presides over open records and open meetings questions, said a work group focused on developing solar policies on agricultural land was made up of all volunteer members and was not appointed by Vice Mayor Dan Wu or Mayor Linda Gorton, and therefore did not meet the definition of a public group subject to the Open Meetings Act.
“Accordingly, the Working Group cannot be a public agency as defined by KRS 61.805(2)(f). The Working Group is made up of volunteer members, meaning that a majority of its governing body could not have been ‘appointed by a public agency’,” the opinion said. “Similarly, the Working Group cannot be a public agency as defined by KRS 61.805(2)(g). There is no evidence in the record that the Working Group was established, created, and controlled by the Council or any other public agency.”
Wu said he was thankful the attorney general agreed with the council and the city.
“I’m glad to see that the AG agreed that we are adhering to statutes related to open meetings,” Wu said.
The Lexington Herald-Leader appealed the question on whether council work groups should be open after it questioned whether the creation of the solar work group, which consisted of four council members and two staff members, violated the state’s Open Meetings Act.
There were 11 meetings of the work group between September 2025 and February 2026, according to city records. The meetings were not advertised. Some groups opposed to putting large-scale solar farms on agricultural land were not invited to participate.
The work group developed public policy and made changes to an ordinance that passed the council’s General Government and Planning Committee 6-4 on March 10. The full council is expected to vote on the regulations, which allows limited large-scale solar on farmland, at the April 28 meeting.
Michael Abate, a First Amendment attorney and lawyer for the Kentucky Press Association, said the the decision does not make sense.
“How can public officials meeting to talk about public business, and draft an ordinance, not be considered a public meeting? Seems to me this publicly announced ‘working group’ is an ad hoc agency whose meetings should absolutely be public,” Abate said in an email.
This is not the first time the council has used work groups to develop public policy. It also used closed work groups to develop regulations on sober living homes and short-term rentals.
The city’s lawyers defended the use of work groups in letters to the newspaper and the attorney general, arguing less than a quorum of members of the council and a council committee had met. Under the state’s Open Meetings Act, meetings where more than a quorum of members of an elected body are present should be open. For council meetings, that means eight of 15 members have to be present to have a quorum. City lawyers also argued the work group was all volunteer members and not appointed.
The newspaper argued the state’s Open Meetings Act makes clear that subgroups of elected bodies who develop public policy should have meetings open to the public.
Some council members and farmland preservation groups had also questioned who had input into the draft ordinance the work group recommended to the General Government and Planning Committee.
Still, Wu has put the issue of work groups into a council committee for review. The city’s charter, which outlines how the council operates, is silent on the use of work groups. The issue will be addressed in coming weeks in the council’s General Government and Planning Committee, Wu said.
“Working groups and task forces have historically been ill definied and I’m always for clarifying and potentially codifying these areas and will use this opportunity to do so,”
