The Rogers City Council and the city attorney, Ben Lipscomb, deserve credit from the public they serve for rejecting a federal magistrate’s order to violate both a state law and the public’s trust.
That’s just something the federal judiciary should not advocate. But Magistrate James Marschewski tried it anyway. We’ll give him some credit here for not the issue.
The situation begins, of course, with a lawsuit. Jerry Hudlow was the city’s treasurer until he was fired in 2012.
He claims he was wrongfully terminated and deserves protection under federal whistleblower law.
A trial to determine how a jury sees things is scheduled for Nov. 18, but it was Marschewski’s job to attempt to get the parties involved to reach a settlement. That’s usually easier when one party in the lawsuit is not a public body, such as the Rogers City Council.
In late September, Marschewski ordered the parties to participate in a settlement conference.
As part of that, he demanded a quorum of City Council members attend the conference because they are the decision-makers about spending the city’s money. Some of us still consider that the taxpayers’ money, just turned over to government for public purposes.
The conference was to take place behind closed doors, with none of those taxpayers or the media permitted inside. Marschewski offered a ludicrous defense, saying Arkansas’ open meetings laws didn’t apply to his ordered decision-making session.
This newspaper, of course, objected, in the fi rm belief that public bodies should always deliberate in public as required by the Arkansas Freedom of Information Act. Lipscomb, being an astute city attorney, came up with an even more convincing argument: Because of the Constitution’s separation of executive, legislative and judicial powers, a federal magistrate didn’t have authority to convene the legislative body known as the Rogers City Council.
Seven of the eight City Council members showed up for the settlement conference and, based on Lipscomb’s advice, told the magistrate they would refuse to participate in the closed session.
Trust us: It’s not easy to stand in front of someone with federal authority and refuse his demands. We’re glad the Rogers representatives stood fi rm.
WHERE’S THE PROSECUTOR’S OFFICE?
As October comes close to drawing to a close, we can’t help but wonder what the Benton County Prosecutor’s Oftce is doing with a local reporter’s complaint that Bella Vista aldermen have discussed public matters by phone before meetings where decisions were to be made.
To paraphrase Elmer Fudd, it’s been “vewy vewy quiet” since The Weekly Vista’s Cassi Lapp filed information about how some aldermen acknowledged discussions by phone, an act that would possibly violate the Arkansas Freedom of Information Act.
Bella Vista is still in its infancy as a city and appears to need some guidance about how its elected leaders should behave in deliberating the public’s business. Some people may believe such matters are trivial, but when taxpayer dollars are involved, the prosecutor should protect the public’s interests.
Protecting the public’s right to know is no trivial matter.
Opinion, Pages 12 on 10/27/2013