California passed a legislative transparency law with 64 percent of the voters approving Proposition 54. The law requires all state bills be posted online three days before the full Senate or Assembly can vote on them. It also requires video of legislative hearings and debates be available online. (KION, November 8, 2016, by Associated Press)
Citizens in Novato are suing the city council over allegedly violating the Brown Act, the state’s open meeting law. The city changed their way of conducting meetings in response to complaints but the group is not satisfied. The controversy arose from the December 15 discussion of two topics not on the agenda to determine if they should go on a future agenda. The citizens want the city to admit it violated the Brown Act and to get the court to enjoin it from violating the act in the future. (Marin Independent Journal, September 12, 2016, by Stephanie Weldy)
A Sonora citizen alleged the city violated the Brown act by deciding in closed session to reject the proposal to consolidate the police department into the Tuolumne County Sheriff’s Office. The Sonora City Council will now allow the public to express their views in a meeting scheduled for November 7. (The Union Democrat, November 4, 2016, by Alex MacLean)
Citizen Allen Payton, Antioch Herald, November 2016, alleges that the Antioch School Board violated the Brown Act by denying school trustee Fernando Navarro’s request for an urgency item on the agenda concerning hearings on a charter school petition.
A former Encinitas official alleged in a letter that two city council members had violated the Brown Act by discussing city business in a hallway in September. The mayor said the discussion violated the law and said the violation should be considered at a council meeting. Council members said the mayor had inflated the issue for political reasons. (The San Diego Union-Tribune, October 27, 2016, by Barbara Henry)
Fairfield is trapped between state and federal law in deciding how to list a closed session discussion the city council conducted about a whistleblower case eventually settled with a $710,000 payout. A federal court sealed the case and prevents even acknowledging the lawsuit. The Brown Act requires that the council list the case on an agenda. (Daily Republic, October 23, 2016, by Ryan McCarthy)
Santa Paula city officials are talking fast in an attempt to explain their failure to report out of closed session a decision to terminate the city manager. The council claims no vote was taken but in ongoing discussions behind closed doors it surfaced that a majority did not want to renew the city manager’s contract. But with no vote it was not necessary to report anything. (Ventura County Star, October 17, 2016, by Claudia Boyd-Barrett
Governor Jerry Brown vetoed a bill in September that would have required charter schools to govern under the Brown Act and the California Public Records Act. Brown opposed the bill out of concern that it went too far in restricting charter schools. The California Teachers Association backed the bill in hopes it would help shed light on mismanagement, fraud and discriminatory admission policies of some charter schools. (EdSource, September 30, 2016, by John Fensterwald)