Tuesday, May 19, 2015

WMB Heartland Justice Partners Tries To Hold Meeting To Lobby Council Members In Violation Of Open Door Law

Advance Indiana has obtained an e-mail several principals of WMB Heartland Justice Partners sent to members of the Indianapolis City-County Council soliciting them to meet with them at the Skyline Club today at 1:00 pm. to address concerns council members have with the controversial, $1.75 billion proposed criminal justice center the private consortium wants to build for the City of Indianapolis. The e-mail, penned by Meridiam Infrastructure's Jane Garvey, Joe Aiello and John Dionisio dated May 18, describes the objective of the meeting as "to see if any compromise could be reached that would enable an agreement for approval by the council on June 8."

Media reports had suggested the deal was dead after council members supporting the controversial project declined to call if for a vote at two recent council meetings because they lacked support from a majority of the council members to move forward with it after the proposal was voted down in committee. City-County Council President Maggie Lewis responded to the e-mail by complaining about the short notice and raising questions about whether the proposed meeting with the company's architects, engineer and fiscal advisors would violate Indiana's Open Door Law. The Council's attorney, Fred Biesecker, agreed in a reply e-mail in response to Lewis' question that the proposed working meeting would indeed violate the Open Door Law.
You are correct that if a majority of the council attended the meeting under these circumstances, it would violate the Open Door Law. In addition, the serial meetings statute (I.C. 5-14-1.5-3.1) generally prohibits a series of meetings that add up to a majority (for example, three meetings each involving five different councillors) if all the meetings concern the same subject matter and are held within a period of not more than 7 consecutive days. 
Hats off to Council President Maggie Lewis for calling out these folks for attempts to conduct meetings with them in secret in violation of the Open Door Law. The Skyline Club, is located in the AUL Tower where the law offices of Ice Miller are located, one of the law firms retained to lobby city-county council members on behalf of WMB Heartland Justice Partners.

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

Truly, we have the best City Council money can buy (the Honorable Christine Scales excepted)... I do not trust attorneys as they've been schooled on how to legally lie and deceive and to do that by using the very law they are entrusted to uphold "against" us everyday persons; so I wonder when I see a phrase such as "...IF A MAJORITY OF THE COUNCIL ATTENDED the meeting under these circumstances, IT WOULD VIOLATE the Open Door Law..."

Call me cynical but I have no doubt Councilors comprising less than a majority have already met with these crooks.

Good grief, just how much more proof do we need at the tips of our noses how utterly CORRUPT is Greg Ballard, the Marion County GOP that runs him, and are most of our Democrat and Republican Councilors? Doubt me?? Look at how they vote...

Anonymous said...

What I don’t understand is why a private contractor is so eager to land a public building project. Public buildings are supposed to be built almost at cost, with very little, if any, profit being made by the contractors.

Ballard’s deal must be really bad and corrupt if this project actually contains not only some profit, but so much profit that the private contractor is desperately trying to get it built.

Anonymous said...

I think one person went from the democrats

Anonymous said...

Who was the democrat that went?

Anonymous said...

clay

Anonymous said...

CPS / FSSA Clay? Heartland might not like to learn...