Opinion ID: 1433828
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 10

Heading: Case Authority

Text: In State ex rel. Stephan v. County Commissioners, 254 Kan. 446, 866 P.2d 1024, 1026 (1994), the Kansas Supreme Court held that telephone calls between a quorum of county commissioners for the purpose of discussing county business did not constitute meetings within the meaning of the Kansas Open Meeting Act. [5] In that case, the Kansas Supreme Court held that the calls did not constitute a meeting because, in 1977, the Kansas legislature rejected the following senate bill: No chance meeting, social meeting or electronic or written communication shall be used in circumvention of the spirit or requirements of this act. Id., 866 P.2d at 1026. That court stated that [c]learly, then, these four alternative opportunities for communication were not contemplated to be within the term `meeting' in K.S.A. 75-4317. Id. at 1027. In concluding that the Board's actions in this matter did not constitute a meeting, the district court relied heavily on Stephan. The Attorney General argues that Stephan is distinguishable because at the time that case was decided, Kansas did not have legislation analogous to NRS 241.030(4), prohibiting circumvention of the spirit of the Open Meeting Law via electronic communication. We agree. In this case, our legislature has enacted language almost identical to that rejected by the 1977 Kansas legislature. [6] Thus, we believe that Stephan inferentially supports the Attorney General's position in this matter. The issue in Stockton Newspapers v. Members of Redevelopment Agency, 171 Cal. App.3d 95, 214 Cal.Rptr. 561, 562 (1985), was whether a series of nonpublic telephone conversations, each between a member of the governing body of a local agency and its attorney, for the commonly agreed purpose of obtaining a collective commitment or promise by a majority of that body concerning public business, constitutes a `meeting' within the purview of the act. In reversing a grant of summary judgment for the redevelopment authority, the California court stated: Defendants argue that because the alleged telephone conversations were conducted serially as opposed to simultaneously as in the case of a speaker phone conference call among a majority of the members, the case falls within the statutory exception to the open meeting requirement where less-than-a-quorum of the governing body is at any one time involved.... [A] series of nonpublic contacts at which a quorum of a legislative body is lacking at any given time is proscribed by the Brown Act if the contacts are planned by or held with the collective concurrence of a quorum of the body to privately discuss the public's business either directly or indirectly through the agency of a nonmember. Id., 214 Cal.Rptr. at 565 (quoting 65 Op. Att'y Gen. 63, 66 (Cal.1982)) (emphasis added). [7] The Stockton Newspapers court felt that if face-to-face contact of the members of a legislative body were necessary for a `meeting,' the objective of the open meeting requirement of the Brown Act could all too easily be evaded. Id. In Roberts v. City of Palmdale, 5 Cal.4th 363, 20 Cal.Rptr.2d 330, 853 P.2d 496 (1993), the California Supreme Court held that a concerted plan to engage in collective deliberation on public business through a series of... telephone calls passing from one member of the governing body to the next would violate the open meeting requirement. Id., 20 Cal.Rptr.2d at 337, 853 P.2d at 503. The Board contends that the California cases are in direct conflict with McKay v. Board of County Commissioners, 103 Nev. 490, 746 P.2d 124 (1987) (hereinafter Commissioners), and thus, inapplicable in Nevada. In Commissioners, this court held that the Board of County Commissioners violated the Open Meeting Law when it conducted public business (settlement of legal action) in a closed meeting with its attorney. We reasoned that, without a specific statutory exception to the Open Meeting Law, it is not the court's place to interfere with the legislature's clear intent that [a] public body that meets as a body must meet in public regardless of whether the body's attorney is present. Id. at 495, 746 P.2d at 127. We went on to say that, because this requirement might create some measure of frustration or inconvenience in a public board's legal dealings, [n]othing whatever precludes an attorney for a public body from conveying sensitive information to the members of a public body by confidential memorandum; nor does anything prevent the attorney from discussing sensitive information in private with members of the body, singly or in groups less than a quorum. Id. at 495-96, 746 P.2d at 127. The above language in Commissioners does not stand for the proposition that members of a public body may vote individually in the physical absence of a quorum. Rather, in an attempt to preserve as much of the attorney-client relationship as possible, it simply reiterates that individual members may discuss sensitive information privately with counsel. While properly implying that members of a public body may ultimately make decisions on public matters based upon individual conversations with colleagues, it reiterates that the collective process of decision making, whether legal counsel is present or not, must be accomplished in public. See again, generally Stockton Newspapers, 214 Cal.Rptr. 561 (1985) (individual telephone calls with attorney to obtain collective promise concerning public business violated open meeting law). Based on the foregoing legislative history and case law, we hold that a quorum of a public body using serial electronic communication to deliberate toward a decision or to make a decision on any matter over which the public body has supervision, control, jurisdiction or advisory power violates the Open Meeting Law. That is not to say that in the absence of a quorum, members of a public body cannot privately discuss public issues or even lobby for votes. However, if a quorum is present, or is gathered by serial electronic communications, the body must deliberate and actually vote on the matter in a public meeting. Here, it is undisputed that a quorum of the members of the Board participated in the decision not to release the advisory. Thus, the Board's interaction was more than a simple public response to Price's comments by one or more of the Regents. Such a response would not have implicated the Open Meeting Law regardless of whether a quorum of the Board was involved. The constraints of the Open Meeting Law apply only where a quorum of a public body, in its official capacity as a body, deliberates toward a decision or makes a decision. In this case, the chairman of the Board chose to invoke the services of the interim director of public information for the University to draft the advisory, and the Regents responded to the draft by calling Eardley on their University-paid calling cards. Further, the draft expressed the Regents' concern that Price's statements were damaging to the Board and the University System as a whole. Most importantly, the draft protested Price's statements in the interests of protecting the integrity of the Board and its policy-making role for Nevada's higher education system. Because the Board utilized University resources, because the advisory was drafted as an attempted statement of University policy, and because the Board took action on the draft, we hold that the Board acted in its official capacity as a public body. Thus, insofar as a quorum of the Board chose to take a position on the advisory, yea or nay, via a non-public vote, it violated the Open Meeting Law. [8] Specifically, it violated NRS 241.010, 241.015, and 241.020, prohibiting closed meetings and requiring written notice of public meetings; NRS 241.030(4), prohibiting the use of electronic communications to circumvent the spirit or letter of the Open Meeting Law; and NRS 241.035, requiring a public body to keep written minutes of its meetings. [9] The Attorney General asked the district court to establish that the Regents violated the above cited provisions of the Open Meeting Law, and for an injunction prohibiting the Regents from repeating those violations. She also asked that the district court void the result of the non-public poll pursuant to NRS 241.036. [10] Because the Board decided not to take any action with respect to the press release, NRS 241.036 is inapplicable. Thus, the Attorney General's only remedy is for this court to order the district court to enjoin the Board from engaging in future conduct that would violate the Open Meeting Law. In Board of Public Instruction of Broward County v. Doran, 224 So.2d 693 (Fla.1969), cited with approval in City Council of Reno v. Reno Newspapers, 105 Nev. 886, 890, 784 P.2d 974, 976 (1989), the court stated: While it is well established that courts may not issue a blanket order enjoining any violation of a statute upon a showing that the statute has been violated in some particular respects ( see Moore v. City Dry Cleaners & Laundry, 41 So.2d 865 (Fla. 1949)), ... they do possess authority to restrain violations similar to those already committed. See Interstate Commerce Commission v. Keeshin Motor Express, 134 F.2d 228 (C.C.A.Ill.1943). This Court may enjoin violations of a statute where one violation has been found if it appears that the future violations bear some resemblance to the past violation or that danger of violations in the future is to be anticipated from the course of conduct in the past. See National Labor Relations Board v. Express Publishing Company, 312 U.S. 426, 437, 61 S.Ct. 693, 700, 85 L.Ed. 930 (1941). Id. at 699-700. In Reno Newspapers, this court examined the propriety of a district court's order permanently enjoining the city council from conducting any closed meetings in the future for the purpose of selecting a public officer after it selected a city manager in a closed meeting. Relying on Doran, this court stated: The district court had a clear indication that the City of Reno had violated Nevada's Open Meeting Law. Coupled with the Council's stipulation to a judgment that would enjoin it from violating the open Meeting Law in the future selection of public officers, this provided sufficient specificity and basis for entering the permanent injunction. Reno Newspapers, 105 Nev. at 890, 784 P.2d at 977. Accordingly, the district court has the authority to restrain the Board from authorizing press releases via electronic communication regarding Board and University policy. While we have chosen to decide this issue because if left unresolved, it is capable of repetition yet evading review, we agree with the district court that an injunction is not necessary at this time. In light of our ruling today, danger of similar violations in the future should be unlikely. Consequently, we conclude that the district court did not err in declining to enter an injunction. Therefore, although the Board violated the Open Meeting Law, the district court properly dismissed the case even though the lower court relied upon the wrong reasons. [11] Accordingly, we affirm the judgment of the district court. [12]