By Rich McKee
Californias Aware
While the City Council's public statements suggest a commitment to open government and the requirements of the Brown Act, their actions tell an entirely different story.

In the City of Fillmore’s January 27th press release, the City attempts to absolve itself of its most recent Brown Act violation. But their cries of innocence sound oddly familiar. Maybe that’s because it’s not the first time the City has denied violating the Brown Act.

After we demanded cure for Brown Act violations involving illegal closed sessions back in August, the City Council and City Attorney immediately declared we were wrong. However, less than two months later, they admitted to the violations, paid our attorney’s fees, and attended a Brown Act refresher training in order to settle our lawsuit.

This time the City Council held a closed session to discuss existing litigation that didn’t exist. On this point there is no disagreement. The case cited on the City Council’s agenda had been dismissed by the court eight days earlier. Nevertheless, the City Attorney again wants you to believe that they are complying the with Brown Act.

Want the truth? Why not look to the California Attorney General, who has already issued an opinion that states: "Discussion with respect to the settlement of a lawsuit requires of necessity that litigation has commenced. Furthermore, the litigation would still be ‘pending’ until a final adjudication or a dismissal of the cause." (See California Attorney General Opinion No. 91-803).

Fillmore City Manager Yvonne Quiring alleges, "With California's statewide budget cuts challenging all communities to do more with less, it is especially disheartening to see this continued allegation and litigation." What she conveniently forgot to mention is the City could have avoided litigation altogether if they had only followed the law in the first place. Even after their violations, a mere admission of wrongdoing and assurances of future compliance were all that we requested from the Council to avoid litigation. But the City Council wanted to save face ... again. And the City Attorney doesn’t want to be wrong … again. It’s too bad that Fillmore's City Council and City Attorney are more concerned with their image than complying with a law designed to ensure the people’s involvement and control over their government.

The city manager appears concerned over the costs of litigation, despite the fact that last year alone the small city of Fillmore paid out hundreds of thousands of dollars in attorney's fees to their City Attorney and outside legal counsel. Isn't it interesting that every time a city attorney’s bad legal advice gets the city sued, that same attorney gets paid even more to defend against that suit. Where else can you get paid more for doing a bad job. Talk about wasting valuable resources.

I have always said that the true test of a City Council is not whether they make mistakes, but how they respond, correct, and avoid those mistakes in the future. All indications here should raise serious doubts as to the intentions of the City Council and the competency of the City Attorney.