What's at stake:
The Fresno City Council was sent a cease and desist letter Tuesday, demanding it comply with California’s Brown Act and open its budget committee to the public moving forward. The city council has 30 days to respond with plans to make its budget subcommittee open to the public, otherwise it could be sued.
Fresnoland, the American Civil Liberties Union of Northern California and the First Amendment Coalition sent a letter to the Fresno City Council on Tuesday, demanding that it make Fresno’s budget committee compliant with state law.
The letter cites Fresnoland’s Aug. 16 reporting on the City of Fresno’s budget process and the role of the city council’s budget subcommittee, which experts say may be in violation of California’s Brown Act for meeting privately with city administration every year since 2018. The letter calls on the city council to open up the budget subcommittee to the public going forward.
“The Council’s conduct—namely holding secret committee meetings about Fresno’s budget process without any notice or opportunity for the public to comment on such a process—flies in the face of democratic principles,” the letter stated. “This letter serves as a demand to cease and desist the practice of conducting budget deliberations in secret.”
Fresno City Attorney Andrew Janz did not immediately respond to request for comment about the letter. In recent weeks, he has advised city councilmembers to not comment about the budget subcommittee matter due to potential litigation, according to two councilmembers who declined to comment.
A Fresnoland review of California’s 10 largest cities found only Fresno, the state’s fifth largest city, claims a Brown Act exemption for its budget subcommittee. This year’s budget subcommittee made at least 75 changes to Mayor’s Jerry Dyer’s proposed budget, totaling almost $30 million.
Dyer, who spoke to Fresnoland last week about the budget process, said the city’s budget reconciliation process is very efficient as it stands and added that changing the process could be challenging.
“Whether or not it should be done in public, I honestly don’t know how that could occur but at the end of the day we want to do what’s lawful,” Dyer said, “and we want to do what is the right thing to do publicly.”
Tuesday’s letter demands a public commitment within 30 days from the Fresno City Council to no longer keep its budget committee closed to the public and to conduct all future committee meetings in accordance with California’s Brown Act requirements — which mandates legislative bodies to meet in public.
If the Fresno City Council refuses to “ensure that the budget committee ceases and desists its secret meetings,” the ACLU and First Amendment Coalition could seek legal action against the council. If they prevail, a judge could ultimately force the city to pay for court costs and attorney fees.
The Fresno City Council’s budget subcommittee is tasked with preparing a final budget for city council approval every year and has done so since 2018. The letter cites how the committee meets with the mayor’s administration to reconcile the proposed budget with council budget motions, as Council President Tyler Maxwell told Fresnoland in June.
The letter also notes how Councilmember Luis Chavez described the process as the budget subcommittee meeting with the city administration in “the back room” to do the council’s bidding.
“Regardless of whether the budget committee is formally an advisory body, its detailed deliberations are effectively the final word on the complex policy and financial decisions embodied in the City’s budget,” the letter stated.
The letter went on to discuss state law and standing precedent for legislative bodies to conduct the public’s business in public.
“Governance shrouded in secrecy is an anathema to the democratic ideal,” the letter read. “We urge you to stop hiding behind closed doors when deliberating on important issues concerning the residents of Fresno. Your constituents can provide necessary and valuable insight. They are not obstacles to be avoided.”
Mayor Dyer speaks out. Other elected leaders remain silent
For the past three weeks, six of Fresno’s seven city councilmembers have either not made time or refused to speak with Fresnoland about what should happen with the budget process and budget subcommittee going forward.
Councilmember Nelson Esparza has refused to comment and councilmembers Tyler Maxwell, Mike Karbassi, Miguel Arias and Luis Chavez have either not returned phone calls or responded to several emails.
Two weeks after saying she was advised to not responding to requests for comment, Council Vice President Annalisa Perea sent Fresnoland a statement Friday: “As the next Council President, I plan to evaluate the committee process to ensure its effectiveness, taking into consideration various factors and input from residents and stakeholders.”
Janz, the city attorney, has not responded to phone calls or emails from Fresnoland on the council’s budget subcommittee since Aug. 1.
Councilmember Garry Bredefeld has been the lone councilmember calling for more transparency in the budget process.
When Dyer spoke with Fresnoland last week, he said he thought the city’s budget process had been thoroughly vetted by the Fresno city attorney’s office.
“That budget subcommittee process is an inherited system,” Dyer told Fresnoland. “It is a system that predated my administration. It was my understanding at that point that it had been vetted through the city attorney’s office prior to Andrew Janz coming in, prior to me coming in.”
He added that he is aware the city attorney has been having internal discussions with the Fresno City Council regarding the budget subcommittee’s future.
