NATCHEZ — The Natchez Democrat has filed two ethics complaints against the City of Natchez regarding city aldermen holding closed-door reviews of proposals for the city’s new waste and recycling collection contract.

The complaints, filed with the Mississippi Ethics Commission, concern both the city claiming the proposals are not public record, thus concealing their contents, as well as a review of the proposals Monday behind closed doors by the mayor and board of aldermen.

In making the decision at Monday’s meeting to go behind closed-doors, City Attorney Bob Latham said disclosing information within the proposals could hurt the city’s ability to negotiate as justification for the executive session — a private conference that excuses officials from discussing certain matters in an open meeting.

Specifically, Latham cited a list of best practices for handling requests for proposals, which can be found in the Mississippi Code § 31-7-401 through 31-7-423.

Mississippi’s Open Meetings Act lists 12 exemptions that would allow a public board to go into an executive session, and in this case, Latham cited exemption (j): “transaction of business and discussions or negotiations regarding the location, relocation or expansion of a business or an industry.”

The second ethics complaint filed Wednesday contends that exemption (j) does not directly relate to the subject matter at hand.

In this instance, the exemption used should not satisfy a valid exemption, said Leonard Van Slyke, Mississippi Press Association attorney.

“That exemption was meant for economic development purposes, not garbage contracts,” he said in a statement.

Further, Van Slyke said he does not believe the statute Latham first used to justify the executive session would be valid.

“In my view, ‘best practices’ is not an exemption under the Open Meetings Act,” Van Slyke said.

Van Slyke has previously said the best practices list does not even apply to Natchez, rather only state agencies are bound be its requirements.

The list of best practices also calls into question whether the city is following all of the guidelines specified within the statute, which just took effect Jan. 1.

Part of the list includes a requirement for an evaluation committee of people who “have the relevant experience necessary to evaluate” the proposals.

The best practices list also requires the committee to prepare a report that evaluates and recommends a certain proposal — that report is required to come out no less than 48 hours before awarding the contract.

Latham, however, said the six aldermen and Mayor Darryl Grennell constitute a committee to evaluate the proposals, and he said those provisions are more for agencies that do not already have a body in place to review such items.

Further, he said the aldermen would not need to release a report 48 hours before, because the point of the report is to show information to officials in charge of making the decisions. In this instance, the board will likely announce its decision right after it is made, Latham said.

As for the executive session, Latham now says that another exemption justified the aldermen’s closed-door meeting: section (l), which allows “Discussions regarding material or data exempt from the Mississippi Public Records Act of 1983…” The broad exemption includes these proposals, which Latham said contain sensitive financial information the city needs in order to make the best decision and exempts the proposals from public record.

Mississippi Ethics Commission Executive Director Jim Hood would not give an opinion on the specific matter of Open Meetings Act exemption used Monday, as he said that would require a formal factual determination by the commission.

Hood, however, did offer a statement that vaguely spoke about the qualifications for closed-door meetings by municipality officials.

“The only legal reasons for executive session are listed in the statute, and the Supreme Court has said they must be narrowly applied,” Hood said.

The city is next scheduled to review the waste proposals a week from today. An emergency contract between the city and current hauler Waste Pro USA expires at the end of May.