Can we require people who attend our school board meetings to show a photo ID?

More and more government buildings are increasing security by requiring visitors to show a photo ID.  Most of the schools I have visited of late have imposed this requirement, and so I have grown accustomed to being run through the system before I gain entry.  The Attorney General was asked how such a requirement would mesh with the Texas Open Meetings Act.

Courts have made it clear that an “open meeting” must be physically accessible to the general public.  You can’t call your meeting in a private dining room, or in a school office halfway across the state.  Suppose, however, that your local school district adopts a requirement that everyone who comes to the school board meeting must show a proper government-issued photo ID, like the ones you show at the airport. The meeting is “physically accessible.” But if you don’t happen to have one of those IDs, they won’t let you in. Is that OK?

Mr. Paxton’s opinion notes that a lot of fact issues would have to be considered in resolving that question, and his office is not the place to resolve fact issues. But he did render a carefully worded, lawyer-like opinion:

A court is unlikely to conclude as a matter of law that the Open Meetings Act prohibits a governmental body from holding meetings at a location that requires the presentation of photo identification for admittance. 

Interestingly, the Opinion points out that some states (Kentucky, Michigan, Nebraska) have adopted statutes that specifically prohibit any sort of ID requirement. Texas has not, and thus the question was ripe for an AG Opinion.

If your school board is thinking of imposing such a requirement, advance input from your school attorney would be very wise. As the AG Opinion notes, a court addressing an issue like this would probably “weigh the need for the identification requirement as a security measure against the public’s right of access guaranteed under the Act.”  Your attorney can help with that analysis.

The opinion is Attorney General Opinion KP-20, issued on May 11, 2015.

DAWG BONE: BE CAREFUL ABOUT TURNING PEOPLE AWAY AT AN OPEN SCHOOL BOARD MEETING.