Office of Information Practices

Opinion Ltr. No. F25-02
February 27, 2025
Meeting Notice by Electronic Mail

Requester sought a decision as to whether the Downtown-Chinatown Neighborhood Board No. 13 (NB 13) violated the Sunshine Law by holding a meeting despite being informed that not all individuals on NB 13’s list of persons who requested to receive meeting notices by electronic email (Email List) had been sent timely notice of the meeting.  The Neighborhood Commission Office (NCO) sends notices on behalf of NB 13 and had notified NB 13 that “due to a technical issue with the email program, some individuals did not receive email notification.”  The NCO informed OIP that 600 people were on NB 13’s Email List, and most of them were not sent a timely email notice of the meeting.  NB 13 admitted it had been “advised of the potential violation of Sunshine Law” but “voted to continue the meeting because two out of the three distribution methods were met and the information to be distributed during the meeting was important for the general public[.]”  OIP found that: (1) NB 13 did not email a copy of its meeting notice to its Email List by the statutory deadline, and (2) although NB 13 had intended to send, and initially believed it had sent, notice to its Email List on the deadline, by the time of the meeting NB 13 had been informed by OIP and the NCO that the required notice had not been sent.  OIP therefore concluded that NB 13 knowingly violated the Sunshine Law’s notice requirement in section 92-7(e), HRS, when it proceeded with its meeting without having provided the required notice of that meeting.

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