Tennessee County Violated Open-Meetings Law, Jury Rules

By: In a sweeping verdict yesterday, a jury found the Knox County Commission violated the state?s Open Meetings Act when members privately discussed how to fill a dozen appointments for term-limited offices before casting a public vote in January.

The verdict nullifies the appointments, which included several relatives of retiring or sitting commissioners and deputies of former officeholders.

?I hope that what we have done here sends a message ... that the people have spoken and have held their government accountable,? said attorney Rick Hollow, who represented Knoxville News Sentinel Editor Jack McElroy in bringing the lawsuit.

?The people of Knox County won democracy today,? echoed attorney Herb Moncier, who represented nine citizens in a companion action against the commission.

?The process worked. A jury heard their government and a jury ruled against their government. That is unique in American history. I am tickled to death for the American people,? Moncier said.

The 12-member panel deliberated about 4 ? hours after a three-week trial in which 47 witnesses testified, including all 19 commissioners involved in the Jan. 31 meeting in which eight commission seats and four other countywide posts, including sheriff, were filled.

The panel affirmatively answered all 29 questions posed by Chancellor Daryl Fansler on whether the commissioners circumvented ?the intent, the spirit or the requirements? of the Open Meetings Act, also known as the ?Sunshine Law.?

Specifically, the panel found that two or more commission members ?decided or deliberated toward a decision? on every one of the 12 appointments before the Jan. 31 meeting, and on two appointments more private discussions were held during recesses in the meeting itself.

Fansler said he would issue a written ruling in a few days that spells out a remedy.

It is unclear if the judge has authority to order a special election under the open-meetings law. Moncier said he would petition the state Supreme Court to answer that question for Fansler.

Alternatively, the commission may ?redo? their vote in public or wait to fill the seats in the next election. The primary is less than four months away with a general election in August.

Whatever Fansler decides, Knox County Law Director John Owings said, ?I hope the judge gives us as much guidance as he can because first and foremost we don?t want to wind up in court again as soon as the ink is dry on the order.?

The appointments filled a dozen public offices declared vacant after the state Supreme Court upheld term limits adopted by Knox County voters in 1994.

The lawsuits suggested that commissioners engaged in backroom deals to handpick their successors. Three of the eight new commissioners had relatives on the commission and 13 of the 19 commissioners either work for the county or have relatives that do. None abstained from voting. Three of the four other posts were filled by their deputies.

One commissioner, Greg ?Lumpy? Lambert, said after the verdict that he never denied having conversations with other commissioners outside public settings, but he didn?t believe they ?reached the level of deliberations.?

?But this jury has handed down their verdict. All 29 questions ruled against us,? he said.

Asked what that means, Lambert said, ?Well, it means that people want our conversations to be more public.?

Former Commissioner Bea DeSelm, who was one of the plaintiffs, said, ?I hope this changes the way things are done.?

McElroy agreed. ?This is a battle we decided was worth fighting,? he said. ?And we will fight as long as it needs to be fought.?

The News Sentinel is a member newspaper of the Associated Press, a nonprofit news cooperative. Both organizations are charter members of the Tennessee Coalition for Open Government, which advocates for open-meetings and public-records causes.