Prosecutor’s Office Tightens Public Meeting Rules for Lewis County Commissioners

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The Board of Lewis County Commissioners will no longer use a 2009 resolution to justify meeting with less than the state-required 24-hour notice to the public, according to a new policy drafted by the Lewis County Prosecutor’s Office and introduced Wednesday to the commissioners and county staff.

The new policy is designed to not only follow the state Open Public Meetings Act, but surpass it on at least two counts, said David Fine, a civil deputy prosecutor with the Prosecutor’s Office. Fine briefed the Lewis County Commission and county staff on the new policy at the commission’s regular Wednesday morning meeting.

“My office believes the citizens in our community and the news media in our community have shown an even greater demand for transparency in government than the Legislature mandated in 1971,” Fine said.

The policy firmly lays out the requirements for public meetings under the 1971 Washington state Open Public Meetings Act, and requires the board to publish and stick to agendas for regular meetings and to give at least 24 hours notice for each additional meeting with a quorum, or voting majority, of at least two commissioners.

In 2009, a previous county commission approved a resolution stating that the board was in open session from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. every day while in the Lewis County Courthouse. The commissioners’ reliance on the resolution was first reported by The Chronicle in March. In recent months, the commission and the Prosecutor’s Office have used that resolution to justify a quorum meeting in the building for a variety of reasons, including meetings with staff and a press conference, without additional notice.

According to the new policy, that will no longer be allowed.

Fine also corrected statements by commissioners Edna Fund and Bobby Jackson from last week, when they and clerk Candace Hallom told a Chronicle reporter that two commissioners could not separately answer the same question from a reporter without violating the Act.

“It’s permitted by both policy and law,” Fine said.

Whether in a press conference or private interviews, commissioners can answer the same question, he said. However, they cannot discuss the question as a group. If a reporter relayed the answers of one commissioner to another, and asked for a comment on that answer, it could potentially become an issue, he said.

Fine invited members of the media and county government to come to him with concerns about the policy in the coming weeks, and said the policy can be updated if an issue arises.

“I realize this is going to be a change and it’s not going to be the easiest of changes,” he said.

Staff at the Prosecutor’s Office began considering improvements to the commission’s public meeting policy in April, Fine said. On April 19, the office sent the commission a proposed policy.

On April 21, Brian Cortland and Brian Green, who Fine said “seem to have made an occupation by bringing court actions,” filed a lawsuit against each of the Lewis County commissioners, arguing that they had violated the state Open Public Meetings Act on about a dozen occasions.

In most of the instances, a quorum, or a voting majority, of the county commissioners allegedly met without advance notice being given to the public of the meeting, as is required by the Act.

The lawsuit alleges that the county’s public meeting policy has been illegal and that the commissioners knew it, Fine said

On May 1, Fine said attorneys from the Prosecutor’s Office met with the commission in an executive session.

“The subject of the discussion was strategy and tactics the county might follow in defending this civil action,” he said.

On that day, the commission’s online agenda expanded to include hyperlinks to detailed agendas of meetings throughout the week.

The Prosecutor’s Office also drafted and implemented a new public meetings policy for the county, handed out to commissioners and department heads Wednesday. Fine said the commissioners were advised they could vote to disregard the policy, and did not.



The OPMA requires governing boards to announce the time and place for regular meetings to the public, and to make the agenda for those meetings available to the public 24 hours in advance. The agenda can be modified after it is posted, and commissioners are not limited to only discussing items on the agenda.

Special meetings can be scheduled with no less than 24 hours written notice to members of the public, and must stick to items on the agenda. Emergency meetings can be called with less than 24 hours notice only in cases of true emergencies, which have been narrowly defined by courts as natural disasters and similar events.

The law applies to each and every time a quorum meets to discuss county business.

Lewis County’s new policy includes those requirements, but is more restrictive than the OPMA on two main points, Fine told The Chronicle.

While the OPMA allows commissioners to discuss items not on their agenda at regular meetings, such as their Monday business meeting, under the new policy the commission will only discuss items previously listed on the agenda.

Second, Fine said, the OPMA does not restrict commissioners from attending social events as a quorum and does not require notice to the public in such instances, provided the commissioners do not discuss county business.

Under the new policy, the commission will give the public 24 hours notice before they attend a social gathering together. While the notification is not legally necessary, it is a courtesy to the public, he said.

If commissioners happen to show up at the same restaurant, for example, it would not be a violation of the Act unless they discuss county business, Fine said.

“Do the best you can,” he said. “Don’t sit down next to each other.”

He also defined an emergency meeting as a response to an “acute emergency,” such as a massive flood. A flooded field does not qualify as an emergency, he said.

County staff can brief the commission on time-sensitive but not emergency topics with less than 24 hours notice as long as the commissioners do not discuss the issue. They can ask clarifying questions, Fine said.

Commissioners cannot, as a group, approve a request from staff without calling a special meeting, he said.

“So we better make the right call,” said Steve Mansfield, county director of emergency services.

While the policy, and the OPMA, restricts the commission’s ability to talk among themselves without public access, it does not restrict the public from accessing its commission.

“The commissioners are not going to wall themselves off under our policy,” Fine said.

He said commissioners can hear information from the public and staff when the issue isn’t on the agenda, but said staff will need to plan ahead if they need feedback.

“If you want the commission to be able to engage in discussion with you, make sure to get it on the agenda within 24 hours of the public meeting.”

Jackson noted the new policy would slow things down at the commissioners’ office.