Not everyone agrees with the interpretation given by the Modesto City Attorney. From www.thefirstamendmentcenter.org a discouraging excerpt:
California
Local government agencies routinely disregard the state's Public Records Act, rejecting outright — or stonewalling — requests for indisputably public information more than 75% of the time. Citizens seeking key records are forced either to abandon their pursuit of the records or to take the costly step of hiring a lawyer to sue the agencies to compel disclosure.
In a recent survey, sheriffs' departments were the worst offender, denying requests for clearly public records 80% of the time. This rejection rate compared to 64% for police departments. Cities performed only slightly better, denying 60% of the requests for public documents, while school districts denied access almost 33% of the time.
This public records "audit," designed to assess local government compliance with the California Public Records Act (CPRA), was undertaken by the California First Amendment Coalition (CFAC) and the Society of Professional Journalists (SPJ) and was supported by volunteer students of the journalism departments from five California universities. Under the supervision of their journalism professors, several dozen university students asked more than 130 local government agencies in the San Francisco Bay Area and the counties of Los Angeles, Orange and San Bernardino for information whose release to the public is clearly mandated by state law.
The records sought were those that track responses by police to citizens' distress calls, why school boards expel students, how cities pursue health and safety violations by slumlords, and why people die in prisons, jails or simply under arrest.
**********************************************************************************************************************
More from the same site:
Brown ActGovt. Code §§ 54950-54960.5 THE BASICSMeetings of public bodies must be “open andpublic,“ actions may not be secret, and actiontaken in violation of open meetings laws may bevoided. (§§ 54953(a), 54953(c), 54960.1(d)) WHO’S COVERED• Local agencies, including counties, cities,school and special districts. (§ 54951) • “Legislative bodies” of each agency, theagency’s governing body, plus “coveredboards,” that is, any board, commission,committee, task force or other advisory bodycreated by the agency, whether permanent ortemporary. (§ 54952(b)) • Any standing committee of a coveredboard, regardless of number of members. (§54952(b)) •Governing bodies of non-profit corporationsformed by a public agency or whichincludes a member of a covered board andreceives public money from that board. (§54952(c)) WHO’S NOT COVERED • Ad hoc advisory committees consisting ofless than a quorum of the covered board(§54952(b)) • Most other non-profit corporations • All other government agencies. State governmentalagencies are covered by the Bagley-Keene Open Meeting Act. (Govt. Code §§11120-11132) WHAT’S COVERED A “meeting” is any gathering of a majority of themembers of a covered board to hear, discuss, ordeliberate on matters within the agency’s orboard’s jurisdiction. (§54952.2(a))Note: No vote or action is required for the gatheringto be a meeting, nor must the members meetface to face. (§ 54952.2) WHAT MUST HAPPENUnder the Brown Act an agency must:• post notice and an agenda for any regularmeeting, (§§ 54954(a), 54954.2(a)); mail notice at least three days before regular meetingsto those who request it, (§ 54954.1);post notice of continued meetings,(§54955.1); deliver notice of special meetingsat least one day in advance to those who request it, (§ 54956); and deliver notice ofemergency meetings at least one hour in advanceto those who request it. (§§54956,54956.5) • notify the media of special or emergency meetings if requested, (§§ 54956, 54956.5);allow media to remain in meetings cleareddue to public disturbance. (§54957.9)• hold meetings in the jurisdiction of theagency except in limited circumstances, (§§54954(b)-(e)), and in places accessible to all,with no fee. (§ 54961(a))• not require a “sign in” for anyone. (§54953.3)• allow non-disruptive recording and broadcastof meetings, (§54953.5(a)), and let thepublic inspect any recording made by theagency of its open meetings. (§54953.5(b))The agency may destroy recordings it madeafter 30 days. (§54954.3(b))• allow the public to address the coveredboard at regular or committee meetings onany item in the agency’s jurisdiction not addressedby the agency at an open earliermeeting. (§54954.3(a))• conduct only public votes, with no secretballots. (§54953(c))• treat documents as public “without delay,”if distributed to all or a majority of membersof a board before or at the meeting, unlessthey are also exempt under the Public RecordsAct. (§54957.5 Local Rules Many local jurisdictions, including San Francisco,Contra Costa County, and Oakland,have adopted local “Sunshine” ordinancesthat grant greater access and openness.Check for local rules.Other jurisdictions often have rules that violatethe agencies listed on this brochure.
WHAT IF. . . • a council member is on a board of a nonprofit corporation—is the board covered?• YES, if the council both appointed himor her to the board, and funds the corporation.(§54952(b),(c)(1))• an agency delegates authority to anotherentity—is the entity covered?• YES, if it was created by the agency’s elected body. (§§ 54952(b),(c)(1))• a council committee meeting has less thana quorum—is it required to meet openly?• YES, if it is a standing committee andhas either a set meeting schedule or acontinuing subject matter jurisdiction. (§54952(b))• members use individual contacts to collectivelydecide an issue—is that a violation?• YES, information communicated to aquorum through a series of contacts, individualphone calls (“daisy chain”), or athird person (“spoke and wheel”) to evadethe public is a “meeting” (§ 54952.2(b); 63Ops.Atty.Gen. 820 (1980); StocktonNewspapers v. Stockton RedevelopmentAgy., 171 Cal.App.3d 95 (1985); CommonCause v. Stirling, 147 Cal.App.3d 518(1983).• agency members attend a conference called by someone else—is this covered?• NO, so long as they do not discussspecific business matters within their jurisdiction(§ 54952.2(c))• a meeting is held by video/teleconference.• YES, if the public’s rights are protected.(§54953(b)) • Every video/teleconference locationmust be accessible to the public, and atleast a quorum of the members must participatefrom locations within the body’s jurisdiction.(§ 54953(b))
***************************************************************************************************************************************************************************************
Found @http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:0GXy5X-q4R0J:www.consrv.ca.gov/dlrp/RCD/Documents/brown_act_web.ppt+brown+act+email&cd=4&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us :
§5492.2(b): Except as authorized pursuant to §54953, any use of direct communication, personal intermediaries, or technological devices that is employed by a majority of the members of the legislative body to develop a collective concurrence as to action to be taken on an item by the members of the legislative body is prohibited The attorney general has issued an opinion stating that this section of the act applies to email. The Attorney General’s opinion regarding e-mail
- In 2001 the CA Attorney General issued an opinion regarding the use of email. (Opinion #00-906, 2001)
- The opinion concluded: A majority of the board members of a local public agency may not e-mail each other to develop a collective concurrence as to action to be taken by the board without violating the Ralph M. BrownAct.
- Even if the emails are made public they would still be a violation of the Act because the board would be depriving the pubic of the deliberative process.
The opinion also states, “The term ‘deliberation’ has been broadly construed to connote ‘not only collective discussion, but the collective acquisition and exchange of facts preliminary to the ultimate decision.’ [Citation.]” (Rowen v. Santa Clara Unified School Dist. (1981) 121 Cal.App.3d 231, 234; see Roberts v. City of Palmdale, supra, 5 Cal.4th at p. 376.)
