Montana Attorney General Opinion 15-203

Opinion No. 203 Schools-Tl"Ustees-lUeetings, Notire of amI Business Tt'ansacted-High Schools-PI"incipal, Election of. HELD: 1\'0 meetfn~ of a board of school trustees should be held without ~iying each trustee reasonable notice of the time and place and the purpose for which any meeting is called. No bu;;;i- ne;;;s should be transacted at such meet· in~ except such as is noticed in the call for the meeting. (Under the fact;;;, the re-election of the high school prin- cipal was the Imsiness of the special meeting.) . May 6, 1933. You have requested my opinion on the right of a high school hoard of trustees to re-elect a principal at a speCial meeting and ha ye gh'en full details of the action taken by the hoard at >;uch meeting. 'While there is no specific statute providin~ for special meetin~s of the trustees. no meetin,g should be held without gh-in~ each of the trustees reasona ble notice of the time and place and the purpose for which any meet- ing is called and no business should he transacted at such meeting except such as is noticed in the call for the meet- ing. Howe,-er, we ,vould say that in any particular emergency if the trus- tees should all meet in regular meet- ing and all agree that a meeting should be held at that time and spread such agreement on the minutes, they could transact any iJusiness that they desired to take up of an emergency nature and possibly any bmsiness of any kind, the transaction of which is not specifically prohiiJited by law. Subsection 3 of Section 83 of Chapter 148 of the Laws of ID31, pro,-ides that a principal may be chosen for not to exceed two years. The meeting of .January 12, 1931, employing a pt;ncipal for three years was not a legal trans- action. The meeting of March 14, Ifl33, employing the principal, for one year would he a legal meeting if it were properly called and held, which would have to he determined by the facts. In any eyent. it is clearly the purpose of the hoard to re-employ the principal and if no action was taken prior to May 1. 1933, the prinCipal will hold over in the absence of any alh-ice to him that he ,vas not to be re-employed prior to that date. See opinion No. 131 (this Yol.) , rela- tive to the employment of teachers and superintendents and principals. which we think will enable YOU to determine the legality of the action of your board in regard to the employment of vour pl·incipnl. 1Ve do not have nil the fllcts nccessaJ'~- to determine the le~alits of the meetings at which such action 'was taken.