Sunshine Ordinance Saved For Now. Will Agenda Item 4.4 Be Used to Revoke It?
On Tuesday, November 9, 2021, the City Council “deleted” Consent Calendar Item 2.8 “Rescinding City Council Ordinance No. 18-10 [Irvine’s Sunshine Ordinance] relating to Brown Act Agenda Procedures” from the meeting agenda. We view this as a temporary victory and thank all those who signed the petition. However, the City Council can add the 2nd reading back to the agenda for a future meeting. In fact, the agenda for the November 23rd city council meeting, released just yesterday, contains an item that is potentially of great concern.
Mayor Farrah Khan and Councilmember Mike Carroll submitted a Memo on November 8th, a day before the Council meeting, to place an item on the following Council agenda, item 4.4, noting that “the City Council has narrowed in on specific items affecting the overall flow of City Council meetings,” and seeks to create a sub-committee to review and update Sections 1 and 2 of the municipal code — the sections that contain the Sunshine Ordinance. This may be used to justify revoking the Sunshine Ordinance altogether.
We will stay vigilant, and we ask you to stay tuned as we maintain our efforts to preserve this policy. In the meantime, we leave you with the top ten reasons we believe the Sunshine Ordinance was deleted from the agenda.
