6.d 1 Legal Training PowerPointCity of Scandia – Council Legal Training
Presented by: Andy Pratt, City Attorney
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Open Meeting Law
All Council meetings must be open to the public, unless a specific statutory exception applies.
The Open Meeting Law covers the City Council, Planning Commission, Parks and Recreation
Committee, EDA, and any other entities created by or reporting to the Council.
The Open Meeting Law covers all regular and special meetings, and workshops.
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Open Meeting Law
The OML applies to any gathering of a quorum or more of public officials, where the officials discuss, decide or receive information as a group relating to the official business of the
City.
Social gatherings are usually not applicable
Parties
Grocery Store
Chamber of Commerce
LMC Conference
Taco Daze
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Open Meeting Law
Specific Exceptions:
Labor Negotiation strategy
Evaluation of an individual subject to City Council authority*
Attorney-client Privilege
Security briefings; emergency procedures
Preliminary
consideration of allegations or charges against an individual subject to City Council authority*
Private data
Purchase or sale of property
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Open Meeting Law
Serial Meetings
Usually refers to a “rolling” meeting between individual Council members, or email correspondence to all.
OML is understood to prevent binding decisions from being made
in this non-public way.
Don’t click “reply all” to an email!
Ex Parte Communication
Planning Commission site visits
Policy adopted last year
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Open Meeting Law
Notice Requirements
Regular meetings Schedule must be on file at City Hall
Special meetings 3 days posted notice, and mailed to all who have requested notice of special meetings
Emergency
meetings These meetings are used for items requiring immediate consideration. No posted notice is required, but a good-faith effort must be made to notify the media.
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Open Meeting Law
“The use of social media by members of a public body does not violate the OML so long as the social media use is limited to exchanges with all members of the general public. Email is
not considered a type of social media.”
At least one copy of the printed materials relating to agenda items that are provided to the City Council at or before a meeting must also be
made available for public inspection in the meeting room while the Council considers the item.
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Open Meeting Law
Penalties
A successful complainant may receive up to $13,000 in reasonable costs, disbursements, and attorney fees, if a violation is proven.
A Council member violating the OML is subject
to a $300 fine, which cannot be paid by the City.
If there are three separate and intentional violations of the OML, the Council member must forfeit the office.
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Data Practices Act
All “government data” is presumed public.
A specific statutory exception must be found to conclude government data is private.
City must maintain all government data pursuant to applicable
record retention schedules.
City must have procedures to allow for timely response to data practice requests.
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Data Practices Act
Staff memos, resolutions, ordinances are all public; Council contact information too.
Emails to/from a Council Member are typically public…whether on “City email” or a private account.
Correspondence
between residents and elected officials is private…but may be made public by either party to the correspondence!
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Data Practices Act
City email accounts Best to use only City account
If personal email account, others may have access to it, thereby stripping confidentiality. Messages may also be inadvertently deleted.
If private employer account, the employer may have policies restricting email use. If a public data request is made, the employer’s email server may have to be searched.
Email messages
are subject to data practice requests, and must be retained pursuant to state records retention requirements.
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Data Practices Act
There must be a “Responsible Authority” to comply with data practice requests.
Recent state statutes require an “inventory” of data maintained by the City. We will be amending the City’s
current documents or will create a new inventory if necessary.
A data requester does not need to identify himself/herself, but the City must receive enough identifying information to
know who to send the data to.
Costs: 25 cents/page for each page copied, if fewer than 100 B/W pages.
Costs: “Actual costs” to search and retrieve government data, including cost of
employee time.
Usually must respond to data requests within 10 business days.
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Conflict of Interest
A public official may not voluntarily have a personal financial interest in a sale, lease or contract coming before the City Council.
Violation of this law is a gross misdemeanor.
Abstaining
from Council discussion is not enough
ALL contracts violating this law are void.
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Conflict of Interest
There are many exceptions to this conflict rule…ask me!
If there is a perceived conflict in non-contract areas, such as a zoning decision, local improvements, license issuances, etc.,
an abstention may be appropriate.
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Gift Law
All local officials (elected and appointed) are covered by the gift law. Very broad.
A “gift” is money, property, service, loan, forbearance of debt, promise of a job, etc.
Cannot accept
a gift from an “interested person” (i.e. anyone with a direct financial interest in a decision the local official can make).
Exceptions: Items of $5 or less, low value trinkets, things
of insignificant value.
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Confidentiality
Council members are regularly contacted by the media and other interested parties.
99% of all Council matters are already public information, requiring no further comment.
If unsure,
check with City staff or with my office.
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Public Purpose Expenditures
General Rule: Cities may only expend public money for public purposes.
Activity benefits community as a body;
Activity is directly related to functions of government; and
Activity does
not have as its primary objective the benefit of a private interest.
Statutes allow money to be given for community celebrations, artistic organizations, historical societies, youth
centers, non-profit senior centers, etc.
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Misc.
Most cities use Robert’s Rules of Procedure to govern meeting participation. The Council can utilize whatever rules or procedures it likes, and may adopt written procedures for the
same.
Appointing a new Councilmember: If there is a tie vote (2-2), the Mayor can break the tie and appoint whomever they wish.
Censure: Councils are free to censure/reprimand their
own members, by a majority vote. How the censure is interpreted is up to the Council, such as:
Member can be pulled from committee assignments
Member may be cautioned to not represent
the City at other meetings and functions
Purely symbolic
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