MACHIAS – The Washington County commissioners engaged in an illegal executive session Wednesday, which the new chairman acknowledged within minutes of opening their regular meeting as “a mistake.”

They convened within the hour before the posted meeting time of 3:30 p.m. and took up a personnel issue before opening the regular meeting to the public.

Those who arrived for the commissioners’ regular monthly meeting at the county courthouse as early as 3:15 p.m. found themselves unable to enter the meeting room. A sign, “Executive session, no entry” was taped to the closed door.

Present at the improper meeting were the three commissioners; the county clerk, Joyce Thompson; and Dean Preston, supervisor of the unorganized territories.

Asked why commissioners were meeting behind closed doors in advance of the scheduled meeting, Thompson on Thursday said: “I have no comment.”

The commissioners are John Crowley of Addison, Chris Gardner of Edmunds Township and Chairman Kevin Shorey of Calais.

Their regular monthly meeting for April had been moved forward one day, from Thursday to Wednesday, to sidestep a schedule conflict. Their usual meeting time is between 4 and 6 p.m. the first Thursday of the month.

Wednesday’s meeting was posted to start at 3:30 p.m., beginning with the business of the county’s unorganized territories. The first item on the agenda was an executive session for a personnel matter.

But the commissioners and the clerk, who also serves as the county’s personnel manager, took up the matter early on their own – contrary to the state’s legislated rules on executive sessions.

Reached Thursday, Crowley said that no one within the executive session realized the meeting was technically illegal.

“I did not realize that,” Crowley said. “I’ll admit that; I should have known better. But you have a lot of things on your mind, dealing with the meeting.”

Crowley also took issue with calling the executive session “illegal.”

“It sounds like a criminal act. The chairman admitted he made a mistake,” Crowley said.

Commissioners Shorey and Gardner could not be reached for comment Thursday.

Shorey did not open the doors to the meeting until 4 p.m. when he used his gavel to call the regular meeting to order. He then moved immediately to the second order of business on the posted agenda, approval of the March meeting’s minutes.

But once called on it, Shorey acknowledged he had conducted business wrongly and said, “I made a mistake.” Then Gardner made the motion to go into executive session following the procedures contained within Maine’s Freedom of Access law, and Crowley seconded it.

Section 405 of the law details the procedure for calling of executive sessions: “Executive sessions may be called only by a public, recorded vote of 3/5 of the members, present and voting, of such bodies or agencies.”

Discussion of personnel issues is a permitted reason for calling an executive session. But the calling of an executive session must take place within the setting of a meeting already opened to the public.