“Based on your agency’s history of deleting audio recordings of board meetings, it has become necessary for reporters to record the meetings because your agency cannot be trusted to carry out this basic governance function.Now that all board members are on notice of the fact that the public must perform this function, any member’s participation in a meeting at which the public has been thwarted in its efforts to make a recording will subject the member to criminal prosecution.” – Attorney Cory Briggs, in a letter to the CVUSD.
By Miriam Raftery
Photo: ECM's recording device, a cell-phone sized recorder on a small tripod next to the front left seat, is clearly not obstructive or disruptive at the May 7 board workshop.
May 17, 2019 (El Cajon) – “Despite lawfully occupying open seats in the front row, reporters have been threatened with arrest, removal, or both if they did not move to the back of the room,” states a letter sent by Attorney Cory Briggs of Briggs Law Corporation to Cajon Valley Union School District yesterday on behalf of East County Magazine. His letter makes clear that such conduct is “flatly illegal.”
On May 7, Ryan Love, safety and security officer for the district, ordered ECM contributing editor Paul Kruze and editor Miriam Raftery to move to the back, where we explained that audio recordings would not turn out due to noise from an air conditioner and the audience. We refused to comply with this illegal request.
On May 14, Love again demanded that Kruze move from the front row to the back, and Kruze again refused. Kruze says he was told that an El Cajon Police officer would be called to arrest him.
Photo: Paul Kruze and MIriam Raftery received the Gloria Penner Award for political reporting from Society of Professional Journalists in San Diego last year for our reporting on El Cajon Councilman Ben Kalasho.
ECM began recording meetings ourselves and posting the audio files on our news site after the district repeatedly violated California’s open government laws by destroying its recordings of meetings and refusing to comply with multiple public records requests for tapes of several meetings, as we previously reported. Our initial request was made to obtain audio of public comments includng a citizen who criticized the board over schools failing state standards, accordin to the state's Dashboard evaluations. We wanted to quote his exact words, but could not, since the district destroyed the audio of that and subsequent meetings. State law allows destruction after 30 days, but not if a public records request has been made before then.
An attorney from Californians aware sent a letter to the board March 19 regarding Brown Act violations and the board sent a reply indicating it would comply in the future, but has not done so. Despite passing a board policy to retain recordings for a year and make copies available to the public on request, new requests for recent meeting tapes were not fulfilled, with the district’s lawyer Dan Shinoff claiming ECM's new requests went to spam. Weeks later, we still have not received any audio files.
Concerned that the board could eject our reporters or bar them from future meetings merely for standing up for our legally protected rights, ECM contacted Briggs about the apparent violations of the Ralph M. Brown Act (California's open government law) and First Amendment freedom of the press infringement.
A member of the public videotaping the May 7 meeting for the Santee Community Connection, intimidated by Love’s demand, did comply and move to the back of the room. His video was live-streamed on Facebook, where multiple viewers asked that the audio be increased because they had trouble hearing the recording, proving our point.
Govt. Code section 5493.5(a) states that anyone attending an open public meeting of a local agency has the right to record audio, video or still photos unless the legislative body makes a reasonable finding that it obstructs view or disrupts proceedings. The photo in this article indicates that the small recording device was not disruptive or obstructive in any way.
Moreover, blocking the press or public from recording meetings or disseminating information is not merely illegal, but also a crime. Got. Code section 54959 states that “Each member of a legislative body who attends a meeting of that legislative body where action is taken in violation of any provision of this chapter, and where the member intends to deprive the public of information to which the member knows or has reason to know the public is entitled under this chapter, is guilty of a misdemeanor.”
Briggs’ letter states pointedly, “Based on your agency’s history of deleting audio recordings of board meetings, it has become necessary for reporters to record the meetings because your agency cannot be trusted to carry out this basic governance function. Now that all board members are on notice of the fact that the public must perform this function, any member’s participation in a meeting at which the public has been thwarted in its efforts to make a recording will subject the member to criminal prosecution.”
His letter demands that the district provide “unconditional commitment” to cease and desist its violations, adding, “My client reserves its right to file suit and seek all available relief in the absence of a timely unconditional commitment, without further notice to your agency.”
The letter was e-mailed to Superintendent David Miyashiro and to Jill Barto, clerk of the board and board member. Barto has confirmed receipt.
Briggs has a history of successful litigation in public interest and government accountability cases.
Comments
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Keep Making Them Accountable
Poetic Justice!
Cajon Valley's board is all Republicans - no liberals.
This has nothing to do with party. The board consists of four conservative Republicans who have been defying state law and one conservative Republican member who has been speaking out against the board majority. She's been atacked for speaking with media outlets about her concerns, and media has been attacked for doing our jobs.
Our media outlet has always stood our ground against bullies, whether it was Kalasho, a Democrat on the El Cajon Council, or Blackwater, a paramilitary contractor, or the Cajon Valley School board majority on the wrong side of the law.
Well, that explains it!
Wrong.
I have great respect for board member Jill Barto, who is a very conservative woman with strong ethics. School boards should not be partisan. It should be about putting the children first. This district has some good schools and some good programs. But there are also problems that they fail to address and when it comes to transparency, they are downright murky.
Do you really think having 8 schools failing state standards per the Dashboard state standards is okay? Don't you think that they should admit there are issues and tell the press and public to what they attribute those poor scores, and what steps they intend to take to make them better? Instead of burying their heads in the sand and blaming anyone -- parents or press--who asks those questions?
Are you good with boards refusing to turn over audios of public meetings and illegally destroying them? If they have nothing to hide, why not make them available?
Do you think it's okay for a board member to sit through a discusssion on a contract worth two-thirds of a million dollars and not disclose that the low bid is from a company owned by her son? Why does the Superintendent have no problem with her violating their own board's policy on recusals to avoid even an apperance of a conflict?
These are the issues we've raised, which we would do regardless of parties of anybody involved-just as we've done when any public official locally in any party breaks the law or is accused of doing so. Recent examples of liberals or Democrats we've reported on include the assault claim against Lemon Grove councilman Arambula, a DUI arrest of Ben Huseo, and the many scandals of then-El Caon Councilman Ben Kalasho.
When public officials start threatening to arrest reporters for recording public meetings, EVERYONE in EVERY PARTY should find that deeply disturbing.
Never said you were wrong,
Thanks for the tips. Sad that you had to pull your kids out
of the district, which does say a lot about problems being long-standing. There are a lot of rumors we've heard but we can't print innuendo. If anyone has documentation or evidence to share about issues with this district, board members etc. you can email editor@eastcountymagazine.org.
As for politics, we're gearing up to start covering local races and will interview as many candidates for the major local races as we can. Conservatives who have done interviews with us have generally said they felt their coverage was fair--examples include current members of the El Cajon, La Mesa and Santee city councils and local mayors. It is harder to provide in-depth coverage when a candidate declines to be interviewed, as has been the case with Rep. Hunter and some candidates who turned out to have a lot to hide, ie, a mayoral candidate who said he was "too busy" to be interviewed and turned out to have 99 tax liens filed against him.
That said, I would welcome some local conservative voices to quote when we are writing issue-oriented pieces and looking for a well-rounded set of viewpoints.
Their brazenness is shocking.
Their brazenness is shocking. It's hard to not see this as part of a (new, foul) national mood emanating from Washington.
School Bullies :-(
Exactly what I was thinking
I was just telling Miriam the other day that if I were a kid, I'd be wicked embarrassed to be going to school under these people. I'd just want to hang out with my friends and go to school peacefully, but these people seem like the type of people to tell their kid that they can't hang out with the kids of "rival" school board members even if the kids are friends.