Section 2-25.3 Closed records.

(1) Legal actions, causes of action or litigation involving a public governmental body and any confidential or privileged communications between a public governmental body or its representatives and its attorneys. However, any settlement agreement relating to legal actions, causes of action or litigation involving a public governmental body or any agent or entity representing its interest or acting on its behalf or with its authority, including any insurance company acting on behalf of a public governmental body as its insured, shall be made public upon final disposition of the matter or upon the signing by the parties of the settlement agreement, unless, prior to final disposition, the settlement agreement is ordered closed by a court after a written finding that the adverse impact to a plaintiff or plaintiffs to the action clearly outweighs the public policy considerations of section 610.011 RSMo, however, the amount of any monies paid by, or on behalf of, the public governmental body shall be disclosed.

(3) Leasing, purchase or sale of real estate by a public governmental body where public knowledge of the transaction might adversely affect the legal consideration therefor. However, any public record approving a contract relating to the leasing, purchase or sale of real estate by a public governmental body shall be made public upon execution of the lease, purchase or sale of the real estate.

(4) Hiring, firing, disciplining or promoting of particular employees by a public governmental body when personal information about the employee is recorded. However, the record of any vote on a final decision, when taken by a public governmental body to hire, fire, promote or discipline an employee of a public governmental body shall be made available with a record of how each member voted to the public within seventy-two (72) hours of the close of the meeting where such actions occurred; provided, however, that an employee so affected shall be entitled to prompt notice of such decision during the seventy-two (72) hour period before such decision is made available to the public. As used in this section, the term "personal information" means information relating to the performance or merit of individual employees.

(11) Sealed bids and related documents, until the bids are opened; and sealed proposals and related documents or any documents related to a negotiated contract until a contract is executed, or all proposals are accepted or all bids are rejected.

(12) Individually identifiable personnel records, performance ratings or records pertaining to employees or applicants for employment, except that this exemption shall not apply to the names, positions, salaries and lengths of service of officers and employees of public agencies once they are employed as such.

(17) Confidential or privileged communications between a public governmental body and its auditor, including all auditor work product; provided, however, that all final audit reports issued by the auditor including the annual independent financial audit report shall be open record s and the city manager may declare individual internal audit reports to be open records.

(18) Operational guidelines and policies developed, adopted or maintained by any city department responsible for law enforcement, public safety, first response, or public health for use in responding to or preventing any critical incident which is or appears to be terrorist in nature and which has the potential to endanger individual or public safety or health. Nothing in this exception shall be deemed to close information regarding expenditures, purchases, or contracts made by any city department in implementing these guidelines or policies. The city council finds that disclosure of such records would impair the city’s ability to protect the safety or health of persons and further states that the public interest in nondisclosure outweighs the public interest in disclosure of the records.

( 19 ) Existing and proposed security systems and structural plans of real property owned or leased by the city, and information that is voluntarily submitted by a non-public entity owning or operating an infrastructure to any public governmental body for use by that body to devise plans for protection of that infrastructure, the public disclosure of which would threaten public safety. The city council finds that disclosure of such records would impair the city's ability to protect the security and safety of persons and real property, and that the public interest in nondisclosure outweighs the public interest in disclosure of the records. Records related to the procurement of or expenditures relating to security systems shall be open except to the extent provided in this section.

( 20 ) Records that identify the configuration of components or the operation of a computer, computer system, computer network, or telecommunications network, and would allow unauthorized access to or unlawful disruption of a computer, computer system, computer network, or telecommunications network, of a public governmental body. This exception shall not be used to limit or deny access to otherwise public records in a file, document, data file or database containing public records. Records related to the procurement of or expenditures relating to such computer, computer system, computer network, or telecommunications network, including the amount of moneys paid by, or on behalf of, a public governmental body for such computer, computer system, computer network, or telecommunications network, shall be open; and

( 21 ) Credit card numbers, personal identification numbers, digital certificates, physical and virtual keys, access codes or authorization codes that are used to protect the security of electronic transactions between a public governmental body and a person or entity doing business with a public governmental body. Nothing in this section shall be deemed to close the record of a person or entity using a credit card held in the name of a public governmental body or any record of a transaction made by a person using a credit card or other method of payment for which reimbursement is made by a public governmental body.

(Ord. 18249, Amended, 09/20/2004, Prior Text; Ord. 17456, Amended, 09/16/2002, Prior Text; Ord. 15733, Amended, 09/08/1998, Prior Text)