City's Agenda Item Satisfied the Brown Act

The City of Oceanside approved the sale of property to real estate developer S.D. Malkin Properties, Inc. In conjunction with the sale, the city and Malkin entered into a proposed Agreement that Malkin would develop a luxury hotel on the land, and the city would pay Malkin a subsidy of over $11 million remitted from transient occupancy tax collected from the hotel. When the city placed the Agreement and related items on its agenda for an upcoming meeting, the agenda item stated that the council would consider: Malkin’s agreement to guarantee development of the subject property as a full service resort; an agreement to provide a mechanism to share transient occupancy tax generated by the Project; and a report, required by statute, documenting the amount of subsidy provided to the developer, the proposed start and end date of the subsidy, and the public purpose of the subsidy. San Diegans for Open Government (SDOG) later filed suit, contending that the city violated the Brown Act because its agenda description was inadequate. The trial court entered judgment in favor of the city.

SDOG appealed, arguing the city violated the Brown Act.

The court of appeal affirmed, holding that the trial court did not err in finding the city’s agenda substantially complied with the Brown Act. The Brown Act requires that a local agency’s published meeting agenda provide a “brief general description” of items to be considered. The wording of the statute, pertinent case authority, and other authority all reflect a general principle regarding the standard necessary to satisfy that requirement: agenda drafters must give the public a fair chance to participate in matters of particular or general concern by providing more than mere clues from which the public must then guess or surmise the essential nature of the business to be considered by a local agency. That standard was met here, where the city published an agenda that was not in any sense confusing, misleading or unfairly opaque and that gave the public fair notice of the essential nature of what the council would be considering.

San Diegans for Open Government v. City of Oceanside; 4th DCA, October 25, 2016