A wrong letter uttered before an executive session in June led the Caldwell school board to reconvene on Tuesday night to acknowledge and cure an open meeting violation.

Trustees on June 8 cited Idaho Code 74-2061B to justify an executive session, but in reviewing that meeting, the district realized that trustees should have cited 74-2061A.

“We cited the wrong code in this instance, and so to be correct, we needed to come in and cure that,” Trustee Sam Stone told EdNews after the meeting on Tuesday.

Open meeting law requires public entities that enter into executive session to be specific about the reason to meet behind closed doors. Section 1A is for hiring an individual, and section 1B is for disciplining an individual.

State law allows school districts to acknowledge and cure an open meeting violation to avoid civil penalties. After acknowledging the mistake, the board on Tuesday had to redo that section of the meeting and discuss the same topic again.

“We’re following Idaho law and we’re also being transparent with the public,” Chairman Travis Manning said in an interview.

Trustee Trish Robertson made the original motion on June 8 and made the motion to cure on Tuesday.

“I move that the Board of Trustees of the Caldwell School District acknowledge that an open meeting law violation occurred,” Robertson said.

In her motion, Robertson declared null and void any action taken as a result of that June 8 executive session. The board then went into a brief executive session to redo that discussion.

When the board returned after a few minutes, Manning said the session was information only and the meeting was adjourned.