Opinion ID: 1399951
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: The FOIA

Text: The FOIA is to be liberally interpreted to accomplish the purpose of promoting free access to public information. Johninson v. Stodola, 316 Ark. 423, 872 S.W.2d 374 (1994). Further, the FOIA is also to be liberally interpreted most favorably to the public interest of having public business performed in an open and public manner. Laman v. McCord, 245 Ark. 401, 404-05, 432 S.W.2d 753 (1968). Statutes enacted for the public benefit should be interpreted most favorably to the public. Ark. Gazette Co. v. Pickens, 258 Ark. 69, 78, 522 S.W.2d 350 (1975) (quoting Broward County v. Doran, 224 So.2d 693, 699 (Fla.1969)). Arkansas Code Annotated Section 25-19-106(a)(Repl.2002) provides in pertinent part that all meetings, formal or informal, special or regular, of the governing bodies of all municipalities ... shall be public meetings. The term public meetings is defined in the FOIA: Public meetings means the meetings of any bureau, commission, or agency of the state, or any political subdivision of the state, including municipalities and counties, boards of education, and all other boards, bureaus, commissions, or organizations in the State of Arkansas, except grand juries, supported wholly or in part by public funds or expending public funds. . . . Ark.Code Ann. § 25-19-103(4)(Repl.2002). The issue before this court is whether the one-on-one meetings between Harding and the individual Board members, by which the Board approved bidding on the property, as well as bid amounts, constituted a Board meeting subject to the FOIA. An April 5, 2002, memo from Gosack to Harding discussed the unique challenges the Board faced in acquiring the property: Acquisition of the Fort Biscuit property would be somewhat unusual. The property will be sold at an auction. We understand the bankruptcy trustee will take bids on each tract individually and on all tracts. The trustee will then determine which option produces the greatest amount of proceeds. Acquiring this property through an auction creates some unusual challenges for the city.  Normally, we seek formal board approval, including an offer price, before acquiring property. If we obtain formal board approval for acquisition of the Fort Biscuit property, the city won't be able to competitively bid for the property since our maximum offer would be public information.  If the city bids, we'll also need to be prepared to bid for the purchase of all ____ tracts. The tracts not needed for the truck route project could be sold or used for another public purpose.  If the city was the successful bidder on the project, the board would need to be prepared to publicly approve the acquisition shortly after the auction date. Backing out of the bid after the auction would be very difficult and unfair to the seller. Our purpose now is to gauge the board's interest in pursuing acquisition of the Fort Biscuit property for realignment of the truck route. Given the number of tracts involved, the board might find it useful to visit the site. If the board is interested, we'll need to have some appraisal work performed to determine how much the city should offer for the property. We would then informally review a maximum offer amount with the board. We'd want to have the board's concurrence on a maximum offer amount before participating in the auction. The parties stipulated that the one-on-one meetings were held to conduct Board business. According to the Affidavit of Bill Harding attached as an exhibit to the City's motion for summary judgment: I asked each Board member if he or she was comfortable with me bidding within this range on the property. Each Board member responded positively. I had each of these conversations with the understanding that any approval for the purchase of the property could not take place until the Board formally convened for a meeting and voted to approve the purchase. An April 16, 2002, memo from Harding to the mayor and the Board confirmed the decision of the Board: This Thursday morning, April 18th, the Fort Biscuit property will be auctioned off to the highest bidders. The real estate portion of the auction is due to start at 11:00 am. We were able to speak to each of you over the last several days and the unanimous response was to go forward with an attempt to purchase the property as a means to alleviate some of the major problems associated with the existing truck route. Since receiving the go-ahead from you we retained Calvin Moye to provide us an opinion as to the value of the real estate to be auctioned. Those values are reflected in the attachment in Tables 1 through 3.    As such we are asking for authority to bid up to the amount reflected in Appraisal + 15% column (tracts 3, 4, 5 and 6), in Table 3 of the attachment. As you can see the maximum exposure to the city is $1,099,688 or $1.1 million. After you have had an opportunity to review the information I will be in contact with you to determine your position on our recommendation. Both parties rely primarily on Rehab Hospital Services Corp. v. Delta-Hills Health Systems Agency Inc., 285 Ark. 397, 687 S.W.2d 840 (1985), and El Dorado Mayor v. El Dorado Broad., Co., 260 Ark. 821, 544 S.W.2d 206 (1976). In Rehab Hospital , the plaintiff sought to void a decision of the Executive Committee of Delta Hills, the regional health planning agency, to file a motion for reconsideration of the decision of the Arkansas State Planning Agency to grant a certificate of need to construct a hospital in Jonesboro. This court stated that a telephone poll of the Executive Committee violated the FOIA where there was no emergency and no emergency notice to the press. However, this court also stated that the most significant issue in this case is what remedies, if any, are appropriate. . . . Rehab Hospital, 285 Ark. at 400, 687 S.W.2d 840. The plaintiff in Rehab Hospital sought to use the Freedom of Information Act solely to mandate the result of the meeting. Id. This court held that some actions taken in violation of the requirements of the act may be voidable. It will be necessary for us to develop this law on invalidation on a case-by-case basis. Rehab Hospital, 285 Ark. at 401, 687 S.W.2d 840. In El Dorado, supra , the issue was whether a meeting between the mayor and four of the city's eight aldermen constituted a meeting subject to the FOIA. This court stated: The Freedom of Information Act applies alike to formal and informal meetings and since we are required to give the Act a liberal interpretation, we cannot agree with appellants that it applies only to meetings of officially designated committees. We can think of no reason for the Act specifying its applicability to informal meetings of governmental bodies unless it was intended to cover informal but unofficial group meetings for the discussion of governmental business as distinguished from those contacts by the individual members that occur in the daily lives of every public official. Any other construction would obliterate the word informal as applied to meetings and make it simpler to evade the Act than to comply with it. El Dorado, 260 Ark. at 823-24, 544 S.W.2d 206. The court further stated: Furthermore, we do not interpret the trial court's judgment as applying the Freedom of Information Act to a chance meeting or even a planned meeting of any two members of the city council. By its very terms the trial court's order applies only to those group meetings such as the facts here showed  i.e. any group meeting called by the mayor or any member of the city council at which members of the city council, less in number than a quorum meet for the purpose of discussing or taking any action on any matter on which foreseeable action will be taken by the city council. El Dorado, 260 Ark. at 824, 544 S.W.2d 206.