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Oversight leads to illegal city meeting
Council rejects incentives for brewery in illegal closed sessionDate published: 8/15/2008 BY EMILY BATTLE Fredericksburg officials say they're going to improve communication among city departments after an oversight led them to call for an illegal closed session at Tuesday's City Council meeting. Shortly before midnight, at the end of Tuesday's meeting, council members approved a closed session "to discuss two prospective businesses where no previous announcement has been made" about those businesses' plans to expand or locate in the city. They were citing an exception to the Virginia Freedom of Information Act that allows boards to close meetings to talk about prospective businesses, but only if those businesses' plans have not been made public. The Free Lance-Star learned Wednesday that Blue and Gray was one of the businesses discussed in the closed session. The company had already applied for a special-use permit for its plan to move from Spotsylvania County into the city's industrial park. Its plans had been publicly heard before the Planning Commission and The Free Lance-Star had published an article about them. After the newspaper pointed out the previous article and Planning Commission action, City Manager Phillip Rodenberg said those details were overlooked when city staff recommended the council close the meeting. "We erred," Rodenberg said. "We have no excuse. We should have known the Planning Commission had acted." Rodenberg said council members are "innocent parties" in the matter. He said they voted to go into closed session without knowing the identity of the two businesses to be discussed. During the session, code names were used to disguise the identity of those businesses. Rodenberg said Blue and Gray's plans were discussed for only about five minutes before the council rejected the idea of giving the business incentives. During that discussion, he said, council members became aware that "Project Brew," as city officials referred to it, was Blue and Gray. "The council and staff pay close attention to [the Freedom of Information Act]," Rodenberg said. "Economic development will see every meeting announcement and every agenda from now on from the Planning Department." The identity of the second business discussed Tuesday has not been made public.
Read more stories about Fredericksburg Date published: 8/15/2008
TPKeller, you really don't get it
(posted by
FXBG923
, Aug. 16, 2008 9:17 am)
Tourists stop in the Fredericksburg area as they're traveling I95 for a bite to eat at a restaurant, whether it's Belman Rd., downtown, or Central Park. If it's late, they stay the night in a local hotel. They wake up the next morning, buy breakfast and gas and have spent several hundred dollars in the city by the time they leave. Wineries and brew pubs are big tourist draws. Tax break incentives are not handouts because the city still gets some tax money they wouldn't unless the business relocated.
@EB
(posted by
larryg
, Aug. 15, 2008 3:06 pm)
I'm not a conspiracy theorist but you would have never known had someone in the know had not told you.
This is going on at the same time the Spotsy BOS also went into closed session on a item that was not legal either apparently.
Further - in both cases - both boards seemed quite confident that they were not in violation at the time they put it on the agenda nor later when they went into closed session.
I would say - at the least - there needs to be some training and/or reminders given.
"The law is a burden to those in power"
(posted by
Blk97F150
, Aug. 15, 2008 12:08 pm)
Geez, do you realize the overall implications of the comment?? Thats like saying the law is a burden to theives.... but the law is SUPPOSED to be a burden!! Especially for 'those in power'!!
Thanks Hemlock...
(posted by
TPKeller
, Aug. 15, 2008 11:38 am)
You are correct, I was not familiar with the service that this business offered... if it is as you describe (not questioning, just pointing out...) then it would seem to be even more inappropriate that they were asking for tourist-related money, since they cater to a well-established customer base. At best, it's a government handout of tax dollars, at worst, it would draw customers away from the real tourist area, downtown. Belman Road isn't exactly the most historic area of town...
@larryg:
(posted by
EmilyBattle
, Aug. 15, 2008 10:56 am)
To clarify, there was no "leak" out of the closed session. We were contacted by the business in question, who asked whether we had heard the discussion of its incentives request. We then contacted city officials to say that if that business was one of the two discussed, we didn't believe it qualified for that exemption because of prior publicity. City officials quickly verified that and responded as reported in the story. But you are correct that FOI is a bit of an honor system.
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