FAYETTEVILLE — The trial in a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit against Washington County regarding access to and notice of a county committee’s meetings was interrupted by frigid weather Thursday and is set to resume Dec. 29.
Elizabeth Coger, a Washington County resident and an attorney, sued the county, the county judge and other county officials Nov. 10 for failure to notify the public of meetings of the Job Evaluation/Salary Administration Program Committee and for not complying with records requests she made under the state Freedom of Information Act.
The committee consists of the county judge, department heads and one member of the Quorum Court, testified Chief of Staff Brian Lester, who’s an attorney. As such it isn’t a committee of lawmakers and isn’t subject to either the public notice or open meeting provisions of state law, he said. Despite this, the committee’s meetings have been open to the public, Lester and Justice of the Peace Butch Pond testified.
Lester also testified he informed Jon Comstock of Rogers, an attorney and former circuit judge, in a Sept. 1 email the meetings were public meetings, but researched the matter more closely after disputes arose about notification, access and records.
“I was wrong in what I told Mr. Comstock,” Lester testified Thursday.
Pond, a former member of the committee, testified the committee’s meetings always take place at 3:45 p.m. on days in which the Quorum Court’s Personnel Committee meets. Whoever is the current chairman of the Personnel Committee is the sole Quorum Court member of the administration committee, he said.
The trial began at 10 a.m. Thursday, but couldn’t proceed because two witnesses were unable to attend because of icy road conditions, special Judge William Randal Wright of Hope was told during proceedings. Wright set the trial to resume at 9 a.m. Dec. 29. The trial is at the Washington County Judicial Annex at 123 N. College Ave.in Fayetteville.
Chief Justice Dan Kemp of the state Supreme Court appointed Wright on Dec. 7 after circuit judges in Washington County recused from the case. Wright is a retired circuit judge.
The Job Evaluation/Salary Administration Program committee makes recommendations to the Quorum Court in regard to pay for county employees, but all discussion of appropriations — including salaries — are held in public by the Quorum Court and the Personnel Committee in compliance with the Freedom of Information and other public meetings law, Lester testified.
The committee also approves some internal financial measures that don’t rise to the level of needing an appropriation of or approval by the Quorum Court, Lester said. For instance, he said, a county department head may have money left over in the department’s budget because all the budgeted salary money hadn’t been spent. This happens when a budgeted position goes unfilled for a time. The department head can propose a raise for a employee in the department to the committee and get it approved without going to the Quorum Court because the money was duly appropriated for salaries already, he said.
Coger’s suit contends the county should publicly post when and where the Job Evaluation/Salary Administration Program committee meets and keep more records, such as agendas, instead of only the minutes taken from the meeting. She requested notice to her of future meetings and hasn’t received it, her suit says.
She became aware of the committee’s existence when Justice of the Peace Lisa Ecke mentioned an action taken by the Job Evaluation/Salary Administration Program committee in an Aug. 8 meeting of the Personnel Committee. Ecke is chairwoman of the personnel committee and one of the witnesses missing from Thursday’s circuit court trial. The other missing witness was Julie Harris, executive assistant to County Judge Joseph Wood.
Doug Thompson can be reached by email at [email protected] or on Twitter @NWA-Doug.
On the web
https://www.nwaonline.com/122222FOIsuit/