Supervisor Seeks Inquiry Over Meeting : Government: John Flynn says a gathering that included two colleagues on the board violated the state’s Brown Act.

Ventura County Supervisor John K. Flynn on Tuesday asked the grand jury to investigate whether two of his fellow board members violated the state’s open meetings law by conferring privately with county staff before passing the budget last month.

Flynn said in a letter to the jury that he believes Supervisors Maggie Kildee and Vicky Howard, who are both members of the county’s budget subcommittee, violated the Brown Act by meeting with four other members budget policy subcommittee members July 10.

“I feel that such a meeting was deliberately exclusive of the public and other board members,” Flynn wrote to the jury.

Kildee and Howard, however, said that the July 10 meeting--held three days before the supervisors passed the budget--was an informal session to review last-minute information from county staff.

The two supervisors maintain that the Saturday gathering was not a meeting of the 12-member budget subcommittee.

“You are making a presumption and an accusation that is very serious,” Howard told Flynn at the board meeting on Tuesday. “You have totally erroneous information.

“There is no violation of the Brown Act in having a meeting with Maggie and members of the staff to get an update on the money that is available in the budget.”

Under the state’s open meetings law, three or more of the county supervisors cannot meet privately to decide public issues. And a recent Orange County court judge found that a majority of the members of government subcommittees also cannot make decisions in private.

But since the case is under appeal, the Ventura County budget subcommittee and other government panels are not required to comply with the court ruling, said Special Assistant Dist. Atty. Donald Coleman.

He said “it doesn’t appear that (Kildee and Howard) violated the law as it currently exists.”

Nevertheless, Flynn said he still wants a ruling from the county grand jury, a 19-member citizens panel that indicts criminal suspects and investigates local government.

“Everything we do ought to take place right here in this boardroom, especially when we are talking about spending the public’s money,” Flynn said. “I’m going to be an advocate of that. I’m going to speak out on it every time I think there is an abuse of it.”

Flynn said Kildee and Howard should have posted an agenda for the meeting, which was held at Kildee’s Camarillo home.

Also attending the gathering were: Chief Administrative Officer Richard Wittenberg, Assistant Chief Administrative Officer Robert Hirtensteiner, county Budget Manager Albert Bigler and Auditor-Controller Thomas O. Mahon.

“We have been following the process of announcing these meetings so we could all take part in them, but this was not done,” Flynn said.

Kildee called Flynn’s accusations “ridiculous.”

“The fact that Vicky and I are also members of the subcommittee does not preclude us from ever talking together about issues that have to do with the budget,” Kildee said. “It is important that every member of this board get as much information as possible from board members, from staff members and from citizens.

“Clearly, the decisions that are made must be made in the boardroom, and we have done that.”