The Howard County Board of Education abandoned a legislative proposal to repeal three local sunshine laws last month, but Del. Elizabeth Bobo, a county Democrat, might give them what they were after anyway - with severe restrictions.

Bobo said her proposal - which will be introduced at a new-legislation public hearing at 7:30 p.m. today in the George Howard Building in Ellicott City - would clear up conflicts between local laws and the state's Open Meetings Act, and would place parameters on a much-maligned "executive-function" loophole in the latter.

"[My bill] would narrow that loophole significantly by limiting when [the board] could go into executive-[function] session," Bobo said. "They could do it to discuss legal matters and a few other things, and they would have to vote and record that they were going into executive-[function] session."

Executive function is defined - too loosely some critics say - as carrying out managerial duties and administration of existing laws. It is not subject to the requirements of the state's Open Meetings Act and therefore allows public bodies to meet in private, with no community notice and no recordkeeping.

The board's main goal in seeking the repeal of the local laws that supersede the state's Open Meetings Act was gaining access to the executive-function exemption for what it described as housekeeping purposes.

Bobo bristled when she heard about it, and created legislation to counter the board's if it went forward with the request. But the board killed the idea at its meeting Nov. 26 under its attorney's advice.

Bobo decided to keep her bill alive after talking with the state attorney general, who she says recommends clarification of the conflicting state and local laws.

If made law, Bobo's bill would let the board perform executive-function duties, but not in secret as the state law permits.

"Delegate Bobo's policy objective, as I understand it, is to make sure that there's a greater degree of accountability by having a vote and recordkeeping and the like when actions are taken in closed session, even if actions fall under executive function," said Assistant Attorney General Jack Schwartz, who also serves as counsel to the State Open Meetings Compliance Board. "If this bill were law, the fact that they were carrying out an executive function would be beside the point."

The draft of the bill says school board members could meet in executive-function sessions only in accordance with one of 14 closed-session requirements listed in the Open Meetings Act, meaning public notice must be given and minutes kept.

Sandra H. French, vice chairman of the board, said clarity is all that she and the other members want, and they are willing to abide by whatever the law becomes.

"It's so much simpler when the rules are all consistent and clear and everybody understands," French said.

But some worry that the bill's wording muddles things further.

"The language is convoluted," said Allen Dyer, an Ellicott City lawyer and parent who is suing the board in county Circuit Court for alleged violation of open-meetings and public-records laws. "It's well-intended, but the devil is in the details in legal drafting."

Dyer said the proposed legislation might be interpreted as making a section of the state's Open Meetings Act inapplicable to the board - the same part that governs when a public body may go into closed session.

"It's a loosening, a dramatic loosening of the current language," he said.

Dyer said he believes the real problem is not the local or state laws, but the existence of the executive-function exemption. He has introduced a proposal, which he has sent to Bobo and calls a "silver bullet" that gets right to the heart of the matter.

"My bill would bring the executive function within the Open Meetings Act," Dyer said. It would do for all public bodies what Bobo says her bill proposal does for the Howard board: make executive functions subject to the requirements of the Open Meetings Act.

"There certainly have been proposals in the past to eliminate the executive-function exclusion from the law," Schwartz said. "The Open Meetings Compliance Board is even on record as lamenting the breadth of the exclusion and has taken the view that at least a serious look should be given to how it might be narrowed. However, there is a long history here ... and there are strong objections from various government quarters to removing that exclusion."

Bobo said she thinks the executive-function exemption is too expansive and subject to abuse, but she is taking it one thing at a time and putting her focus solely on the Board of Education for the time being.

"It's just too broad an exemption for all kinds of public bodies, but what's come to my attention right now, is that the Howard County board wants to use it very liberally," she said. "I believe that there should be as much sunshine in government as possible."