Unauthorized meetings to discuss matters within jurisdiction
Q: I have questions about the brown act. If three city council members meet at private home owners associations and each discuss city business and pending issues the council will be voting on, is that considered a violation of the brown act?
A: Government Code section 54952.2 (set forth in its entirety below) defines a “meeting” as follows:”[M]eeting” includes any congregation of a majority of the members of a legislative body at the same time and place to hear, discuss, or deliberate upon any item that is within the subject matter jurisdiction of the legislative body or the local agency to which it pertains.Any “meeting” as so defined is subject to the requirements of the Brown Act (including the requirement that meetings be preceded by public notice and public distribution of an agenda, as well as the requirement that meetings be open to the public (unless an exception established by the Brown Act applies, which does not appear to be the case in the situation you have described).
You have indicated that three members of the City Council met to discuss topics within the subject matter jurisdiction of the City Council. The question is whether three members constitute a “majority of the members” of the City Council. If the City Council has five members, the answer is yes, and the meeting—as you have described it—would appear to violate the Brown Act. If the City Council has seven or more members, the answer would be that the meeting would not be subject to the Brown Act