Letter: Healthcare District Meeting’s may have violated Brown Act

Something occurred out of the ordinary course of business at the Oct. 27 Healthcare District Meeting. It was not on the agenda, but the directors were already familiar with it, judging by the lack of questions. I attended via Zoom teleconferencing link, as the only member of the public to call in for the meeting. This might be because the unique Zoom link was not published till the morning of the meeting, due to a computer glitch.

At the end of the meeting, Chairman Caldwell brought up scheduling the (Masonic) Lodge for an in-person meeting for the closed portion of the current meeting, to occur over a week later. He stated that he did not want to schedule it as a Special Meeting, because otherwise public notice would need to be done.

The date and time decided was Nov. 5 at 5 p.m. The purpose of the meeting was “real property negotiation” to be done by a committee of two, consisting of Directors Caldwell and Henion. Caldwell gave the address of the property, specifically so that it could be published in the minutes later, as 100 A Street, which is the Oceanfront Lodge. It should be noted that the Agenda did not have any topic listed for the closed part of the meeting, which is usually required.

Discussing a topic not included on the published Agenda is a violation of the Brown Act. Based on a review of minutes through August, there is no mention of real estate negotiation. Since minutes for closed sessions are not published, the extended nature of the closed portion of the October meeting would not be easily available to anyone not present for this meeting.

The audio portion of the 20 minute meeting was recorded. The audio tape is available for review by visiting the Healthcare District Office, in person only, Monday-Friday, 8 a.m. -noon. The agenda is available at http://www. co.del-norte.ca.us/local-resources/health-care-district.

Helen DuVernay

Crescent City