City Council Will Ratify Earlier Secret Vote Tonight: City Manager To Get Raise
Written by 991KBU on May 29, 2018
Malibu’s city council will meet tonight … to vote in public for the first time to ratify the contract extension and raise it has already offered to city manager Reva Feldman.
The council has already decided once … meeting behind closed doors … to extend the offer of a new three year contract – and raise – to the city manager.
Feldman will … in her third year … earn 260 thousand dollars per year in salary … with a vehicle allowance and benefit package that will also bring that up substantially.
The city manager is the chief boss at city hall … overseeing a staff of nearly 80 and administering a budget of 77 million dollars next year.
The city manager was given a secret job performance review two weeks ago by the city council.
After that … the city attorney announced in public that no reportable action had been taken that night.
But the city attorney did -not- announce that the new contract had been authorized … behind closed doors… with no public comment or public remarks from the city council.
City attorney Christi Hogin tells KBUU News that this was -not- a violation of the state’s open meetings laws.
In a written statement … as voiced by a KBUU volunteer … the city attorney agrees that the city council authorized her to maker the new contract offer and raise to the city manager in an executive session …. away from the public.
NEWSCART 77572 :21 QQQ: REPORTING THE INSTRUCTIONS.
“Where you leave the highway is the presumption that that action was subject to reporting.
“It was not. The city cannot take final action on a city manager contract in closed session.
“Plus, the Brown Act explicitly permits the city to confer with one another and instruct a negotiator without reporting the instructions.”
That’s City Attorney Christi Hogin … as voiced by a KBUU volunteer.
The Brown Act she refers to is the state open meetings law.
One section of that law specifically requires that any city council action that alters the “employment status” of any public employee to be announced as soon as it is made.
Here … the city council authorized a large raise and three year contract for the city manager … in secret.
It did not announce it for more than a week.
Did the city council’s decision that the city manager gets a positive job review … a raise and a new three year contract … change the city manager’s employment status?
The city attorney says it did not.
NEWSCART 77571 :16 QQQ: OPPORTUNITY FOR PUBLIC COMMENT.
“The city manager’s proposed contract is not final.
“Final action must be taken in open session after an opportunity for public comment.”
The words of Christi Hogin … Malibu City Attorney … as voiced by a KBUU volunteer.
Although the city attorney says the state law has a clause that allows such secret actions … the state law in no way requires such major decisions to be made behind closed doors.
The city council could have conducted the job review in an executive session … then moved discussion about a new contract and raise out into the public … had it set the agenda up that way.
The city attorney says that’s what tonight’s vote is.
But tonight’s vote is a ratification of a decision that was already been made … in secret … behind closed doors … away from the public.
And the city kept that decision to itself for more than a week.
The issue of secrecy in the decision is … frankly … a sideshow …
The question is the job performance of Reva Feldman … who gets generally very high marks across the city for her performance.
The three city council members elected on a reform slate last election apparently endorse the new contract extension and raise.
We don’t know for sure … because the meeting was secret.
