Gilroy’s City Council will consider correcting a violation of
state public meeting law next week during a special meeting Dec.
30.
Gilroy’s City Council will consider correcting a violation of state public meeting law next week during a special meeting Dec. 30.
The meeting comes after Superior Court Judge Kevin Murphy stated Dec. 14 that the council violated the state Brown Act in its dealings with MediLeaf, a medical marijuana dispensary that opened without a business license of Nov. 9. The city has spent an estimated $37,300 on fighting MediLeaf so far, City Administrator Tom Haglund wrote in an e-mail to Councilman Perry Woodward last week. Woodward has demanded for a full refund of these costs based on what he claims as sub-par advice from the firm that the city contracts with for legal services.
Batzi Kuburovich, one of MediLeaf’s directors, wrote in a letter to the City of Gilroy that the council had violated the Brown Act last month when council members approved a resolution in closed session to allow the city attorney to take legal action against the collective.
Three council members boycotted the closed session on Nov. 16, saying that they believed matters pertaining to MediLeaf, particularly zoning and licensing issues, should have been discussed publicly.
City Attorney Linda Callon could not be reached for comment Tuesday, and a staff report regarding next week’s meeting was not available, so it was not clear what steps the city attorney would recommend to correct the alleged violation.
Council members had mixed responses this week to the alleged Brown Act violations and to the amount that the city is paying on litigation to fight MediLeaf.
Councilwoman Cat Tucker, one of the four council members who attended the Nov. 16 meeting and voted in support of the resolution, said that she believed that next week’s meeting was solely a precautionary measure and that the council never violated the Brown Act. As for the legal costs that the city has incurred thus far, she said council members knew they would have to spend money to fight MediLeaf.
“I think they’re doing what they told us they were going to do,” Tucker said.
On the other hand, Woodward, who is an attorney himself, said Berliner-Cohen is overpriced and has let the council down twice – by advising against approving some kind of ordinance and by leading council members to violate the Brown Act.
“This is not a case where the attorney did everything right,” Woodward said.
