Douglas County commissioners broke state open meeting laws when they adopted resolutions calling for an election to establish a home rule charter, three residents and former elected leaders across political spectrums said in a lawsuit filed Tuesday.
The lawsuit asks a district court judge to order the board of county commissioners to stop violating Colorado’s open meetings laws and to invalidate previous decisions that were “unlawfully made in the proverbial shadows of a smoke-filled back room,” the plaintiffs wrote in a statement Tuesday.
Bob Marshall, a Democrat, Lora Thomas, a Republican, and Julie Gooden, who is registered as unaffiliated, filed the suit Tuesday against the three-person board, who allegedly held meetings and made decisions behind closed doors since December without informing the public.
Thomas, a former DougCo commissioner, previously sued two of her former colleagues amid yearslong public feuds among the county’s elected leaders. Thomas left office in December, before her replacement Kevin Van Winkle was sworn in weeks later.
A Douglas county spokesperson did not immediately return a request for comment.
According to the lawsuit, commissioners Abe Laydon, George Teal and Kevin Van Winkle met during private meetings to discuss the home rule charter and then decided to hold a public election to ask voters to establish Douglas County as a home rule entity to give the county significant authority to govern itself and prevent the state from imposing unfunded mandates.
With 24 hours notice, the board convened a 10-minute public meeting, which wasn’t livestreamed as other meetings are, and adopted the resolutions, formally placing them on the ballot, without hearing from the public, according to the lawsuit.
If the ballot measures are passed, it would turn Douglas County into a home rule county, fundamentally changing the governmental structure for the county.
Only Weld and Pitkin counties have adopted the home rule structure, and they did so after citizens proposed it and several public meetings were held to discuss the pros and cons, the lawsuit stated. No Colorado county has adopted a home rule charter after county commissioners initiated it.
In a home rule county, its governing system is defined by its own charter rather than by state statutes.
According to public records, the county commissioners met on 11 occasions to discuss public business without informing the public that the meetings were happening, the lawsuit stated. Commissioners also met on two occasions during which the public was not allowed to attend.
On April 2, all three commissioners attended a meeting of the Parker Conservatives, where they discussed converting the county into a home rule entity, but the county did not post the meeting or allow the public or the media to attend.
The commissioners also violated open meetings laws, the lawsuit stated, when they met on three separate occasions to discuss public business in “executive session,” but failed to announce those discussions during public meetings, as required by state law.
No minutes were taken at the closed-door meeting in which Douglas County commissioners decided to hold a public election, the lawsuit stated. The only time the public could comment on the home rule proposal was during a “special business meeting” on March 25, not at the regularly scheduled board meeting, which was held later that day.
Two newspapers wrote front-page stories about the commissioners addressing the home rule charter outside the public eye, accusing the elected officials of violating Colorado’s sunshine laws. A county spokesperson told a Douglas County News-Press reporter that there was “no intention to hide anything,” even though the event explicitly advertised that the general public and press were excluded from attending, according to an April 4 article.
Not all meetings are required to be open to the public, under state law, but the public must be informed if any policy, resolution or formal decision is made. Notice of the meeting must be posted in a designated public place at least 24 hours before the meeting, the law requires.
The law prohibits the adoption of any rule, regulation, policy or formal action at a meeting closed to the public. Minutes must be taken for meetings during which a decision is made or could be made.
This is a developing story that will be updated.
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