06/10/2008: "County Council To Formalize Their Monday Meetings?"

The County Council has become a bit schizophrenic of late when it comes to their Monday morning staff meetings. For years the meetings were brief work sessions with staff members to set the agenda, and deal with staff issues, prior to the “Regular” scheduled meeting held on a Tuesday. A "regular" meeting is a ” a recurring meeting held pursuant to a schedule fixed by statute, ordinance, or other appropriate rule”

The public open meetings act in Washington sets firm rules on when a council can take “action” and, and what constitutes a “final action”, and in the past the council has made attempts to not cross the line during the Monday staff meetings.

But somewhere along the line of going from a three member commission, to a six member council, the meetings started to include more general discussion and council positioning on policy then had previously been the case, and it has become increasingly clear to some the council is taking action at the Monday meetings, but, so far, not voting on actions, but are reaching consensus on actions.

Some members of the public -and members of the press- have questioned the council as to their intent, noting that the differences between the Monday and Tuesday meetings have become blurred. Council Chair Howard Rosenfeld said on Monday that the council was moving toward making the Monday meetings “regular” meetings, and may include citizen access time and providing of agendas to members of the public and the press.

In the mean time the Council is having it both ways, with some members reminding each other that the council cannot take “action” on a Monday, and Rosenfeld saying they can if they want to; while members of the public -and perhaps some members of the council- are not clear if action in some form is taking place, or not, on Mondays.

The law is quite clear that action is being taken on Mondays, and it appears that “final action”, as defined by RCW 42.30.020; Definitions: (3) "Action" means the transaction of the official business of a public agency by a governing body including but not limited to receipt of public testimony, deliberations, discussions, considerations, reviews, evaluations, and final actions. "Final action" means a collective positive or negative decision, or an actual vote by a majority of the members of a governing body when sitting as a body or entity, upon a motion, proposal, resolution, order, or ordinance, may also be taking place.

At this point the only thing that is really, really, clear, is that it is not clear if Mondays are pre-meeting staff and work sessions, or the start of the weeks regular meetings, in which the public is to be notified of agenda items, and that the council may, or may not, take action on items that do, or do not, appear on the agenda. At the Monday’s meeting it was suggested to the council that a clear statement from them would be helpful in letting the public know if they should be showing up at Monday meetings.