City government:
Transparency becomes a topic of concern,
CHICO >> As Chico government buildings shut down to the public during the COVID-19 lockdown, a new problem emerged which never fully resolved — how to fulfill the duties of transparency and public participation, and follow the Brown Act.
Nowhere was this more apparent than in watching changes to the Chico City Council regular meetings, before and after an election, and how the public could still access city committees and commission meetings.
The council first announced going into “essential business” only mode March 25, 2020, and barring public presence in the chambers until further notice. Council meetings were recorded live to be found on the city’s website. Chico participants were soon told to comment on agenda items before a meeting, they could send emails to a designated city email, and the Engaged Chico website was created for a commenting feature.
City Clerk Debbie Presson said Wednesday all standing meetings are subject to the Brown Act and all council meetings are videotaped and available on DVDs as well as the streaming video being archived and maintained on the city’s website, https:// chico.ca.us.
Transparency problems
Over time, the issue of public participation and transparency behind doors closed to in-person attendance became one of the main complaints the council received. During periods when people could not enter the building, public comments were not heard from the speaker, but were read silently by city councilors. Tension over controversial issues led to complaints that the city was not working hard enough to properly address the need for public discourse.
Perhaps worse, as recently as this month, live stream video of the council meetings is often fraught with technical problems with audio blackouts and freezes which cut out significant parts of the meeting and obscure public comments. Presson said staff is aware of these issues with videos of meetings.
And a new issue arose with closed session meeting reports. To satisfy the Brown Act, although the public cannot attend closed session meetings, the city attorney must report out results of the closed session publicly directly after each meeting. Because the public could not be in the council chambers at any time under current restrictions, a decision to fire the city attorney went announced Feb. 2 at midnight with no one present to hear the announcement.
Staff claimed the decision did not violate the Brown Act, even though the report made after the closed session was not recorded or noted in the council summary reports regularly released the day following a regular meeting, by Public Information Officer Lynda Gizzi.
However, California Newspapers Publishers Association staff attorney Brittney Barsotti said Feb. 23 that for council to make such reports about closed session meetings, without allowing the public inside the building or otherwise recording or reporting the results in some other way, raises issues with meeting the basic requirements of the Brown Act.
“They fired the person who could have told them what they were supposed to be doing,” Barsotti said Feb. 23.
She added Wednesday it continues to be an issue if the council will not try to adjust how closed session reports are given.
The city briefly resumed modified public participation in August, with new precautions like asking people to wait outside in line to speak, wearing a mask, and to only approach the shielded podium one at a time. Sizable police presence was required, making the operation a costly one to the city.
However, when a second wave of COVID-19 case increases hit in October, meetings returned to barring any public attendance inside the building.
The first meeting with Zoom capabilities did not happen until February, but this development has proved to be fairly successful in allowing the voice of each speaker to be heard live in the chambers.
Members of the public still complain about their impaired ability to participate, and as recently as Tuesday a protest outside the chambers of between 7 and 10 people called for immediately allowing people to enter and be part of the meeting inside the building again.
Committees
There have been other issues with standing committees and access to them. Temporary “ad hoc” committees do not have the same requirements under the Brown Act as standing committees. Presson said because of COVID-19 restrictions, committees allowed public input access via Zoom and before that, via the WebEx application.
However, anyone who could not join virtual meetings for any reason would not find a recording on the city website. Recordings are not generally made of committee meetings as the Brown Act does not require the video taping of any meetings.
Presson said however, if videos are made, they then become a public record and have to be maintained, and as an example, for the temporary police advisory committee meetings, a USB file could be retrieved. However, in October, one meeting’s recording was cut short and only 20 minutes of a 90 minute meeting were recorded, reflecting ongoing technical difficulties.
City management was not available before deadline to address these issues, Public Information Officer Lynda Gizzi said Wednesday.
“Once the COVID-19 restrictions are lifted, public input will once again be made in person and Zoom will no longer be used,” Presson said Wednesday.