From the East Wake News (2/17/10): Two town commissioners who met last month with a Wake County economic development official held another closed-door meeting last week, this time with property owners who own land in an area the town wants to turn into an office park.
Unlike the Jan. 22 meeting, last Thursday’s meeting appears to fall within the letter of the state’s open meetings’ law.
That’s because Commissioner Sid Baynes formally enlarged the size of the town board’s economic development committee to include all five town commissioners at last Monday night’s town board meeting. Baynes and Hinnant, the two commissioners who met with Wake County economic developer James Sauls last month, were the only commissioners present at Thursday night’s meeting, which also included Town Manager David Bone, Planning Director Teresa Piner, Sauls and about 15 property owners and their representatives.
Bone told a reporter who attended the meeting to leave because the meeting was not considered a public meeting.
When asked to explain why, Bone offered little explanation. “This isn’t a public meeting,” Bone said.
Baynes had previously said such meetings should not be public because they put too much pressure on land owners to sell their property.
The state’s open meetings law says that if a majority of the board of commissioners, or the majority of a town board committee meets, the meeting is a public meeting and is subject to the state’s public notice requirements. By having just two commissioners present, the town skirted those requirements.
John Bussian, a First Amendment attorney who lobbies for the North Carolina Press Association, said the meetings don’t appear to meet the spirit of the state’s open meetings law.
“If there’s a systematic use of just less than a majority, then that suggests to me that someone’s trying to pull a fast one,” Bussian said.
Baynes hinted at that idea last Monday as he commented on plans to put Gray in charge of a committee to work with the Shovel-ready program.
“And, we’ll, again, with the economic development committee being made up of all commissioners, we’ll have a meeting some time in the future. All of us may or may not be there, depending on the situation, but I’ll keep everybody posted on whatever the needs are and whatever happens there,” Baynes said.
According to a letter sent to property owners on Jan. 27, the meeting was called to explain the Shovel-Ready site program. That program is a joint venture between the town, the county and the property owners to market and develop property for a certain purpose.
Town leaders have singled out an area around the U.S. 64/ 264 Bypass as a prime location for an office park. It is the same site the town was hoping to lure WakeMed to before developers of Wendell Falls made a successful pitch to locate the facility in that development. The 250-acre site is owned by several parties.
Baynes worked to make sure the meeting was not a public meeting.
In an e-mail dated last Wednesday, he asked Bone if he had confirmed that the meeting would not be considered a public meeting.
Thursday’s meeting followed by just three days a town board meeting in which two commissioners enlarged the membership of committees they chair to include all five commissioners. In addition to Baynes, Commissioner Ginna Gray also added three commissioners to the Education and Community Relations Committee and to a committee she was appointed to chair which oversees economic development matters, including the Shovel-Ready sites program.
Despite chairing the committee which works with the Shovel-Ready program, Gray was not in attendance at Thursday night’s meeting.
At Monday night’s town board meeting, she criticized coverage of the town’s new committee structure.
“Sadly, it’s been misconstrued in an attempt to sensationalize what we’ve been trying to accomplish,” Gray said.
by Johnny Whitfield, East Wake News Staff Writer