The City Council has clearly violated the Brown Act and by its own standard should resign. It would be incredibly surprising if this City Council (sans Ms. Ulich) resigns, would it not? I predict they won’t. Albeit, their blatant violation of the Brown Act is the highest form of contempt and disrespect ever leveled at the good residents of this community.
The appellate court, with three judges, determined that the City Council violated the Brown Act. The Brown Act is the law that requires all public business be conducted in a public meeting and requires elected officials to let the public speak, i.e., a development “deal” must be conducted in public not in an executive session. Keeping the public out is how carpet-bagging spec developers control this city council and get away with polluting our environment.
Will they resign? I fear the worst: continued litigation paid for with our tax dollars to argue in defense of their petty ego; immorally supported by spec developers and their cronies with a “major” PR offensive, including the barrage of typically insulting personal attacks in Letters to the Editor and Internet blogs.
Our city government is not above the law. However, council members Jeff Jennings, Ken Kearsley, Andy Stern and Sharon Barovsky obviously think they are. Now think to yourself: How many mistakes by an employee would you tolerate before you terminate them? Two? Three? Can you recall all this City Council’s erroneous decisions that have affected all of us? There have been far too many in my book.
The spec developer community has strongly influenced the City Council policy-making agenda since the beginning of cityhood in 1992 and more so since 2000. Now they have shown us just how corrupt our small city government can become.
Bob Purvey