Accurate minutes that support the open-meeting record

Why public minutes have to be accurate and settled

For a public body, the minutes are the official account of what happened — the actions taken, the votes recorded, who was present — and they are only official once the body approves them at a later meeting. Two things routinely go wrong. First, the draft is inaccurate or thin because a clerk reconstructed it from memory days later, and corrections drag across meetings. Second, the approval step gets muddled: it is unclear which draft was approved, what was amended before approval, or whether a set was ever approved at all. When the minutes are shaky or their approval is untracked, the body's official record of its own decisions is unreliable exactly where it needs to be firm.

What MinuteSmith does

• Accurate minutes from the meeting itself. Minutes capture each action, motion, roll-call vote, and attendance from the meeting as it runs, so the draft reflects what actually happened rather than a clerk's later reconstruction.
• Approval of prior minutes, tracked. The approval of a prior set of minutes — including any amendments made before approval — is recorded against both meetings, so it is clear which version became official and when.
• Each set part of the settled record. Once approved, minutes join a searchable run of the body's record, so Ask AI can answer what was decided at any past meeting with a citation to the approved minutes, not a draft.

What you keep

• Draft and approved minutes for every public meeting
• Actions, motions, roll-call votes, and attendance in each set
• The approval of prior minutes and any amendments made before approval
• A searchable run of approved minutes across years

Ask your archive

Questions this record can answer — every answer cites the exact meeting it came from:

• “When were the minutes from the March meeting approved?”
• “What amendments were made to the draft before it was approved?”
• “What action did the board take on the contract, per the approved minutes?”
• “Which recent meetings still have minutes awaiting approval?”

Security & data handling

Private AI over your own records — your minutes are never used to train AI models. See the Trust Center and Security page; for a procurement or security review, contact our security team.

Frequently asked questions