Closed Session: Litigation
The city council is scheduled to have a closed special session meeting at 6:00 this evening, to discuss litigation. My question is, which litigation? The agenda on the city website doesn't say. It might be CoPar's suit against the city; or Sherrie Le's wrongful dismissal suits; or the Keyser/Lazaryan imbroglio (which, to be fair, I don't think can really be laid at the triumvirate's feet, unlike the other two); or, for all we know, it might be something coming down the pike about violations of the open meeting law.
I realize the discussions at the meeting are confidential, and rightly so if matters of legal strategy are being discussed, but it would be nice to know which lawsuit(s) are at issue.
And, finally -- let's remember that this mayor and her majority promised that reducing the city's exposure to lawsuits would be a big priority on their agenda. Yeah, we've said it before, but it bears repeating every time that Kantrud & Co. get to bill us all for a bunch more hours defending us against lawsuits that didn't need to happen in the first place, were it not for the clowncil's myopia and incompetence.
I realize the discussions at the meeting are confidential, and rightly so if matters of legal strategy are being discussed, but it would be nice to know which lawsuit(s) are at issue.
And, finally -- let's remember that this mayor and her majority promised that reducing the city's exposure to lawsuits would be a big priority on their agenda. Yeah, we've said it before, but it bears repeating every time that Kantrud & Co. get to bill us all for a bunch more hours defending us against lawsuits that didn't need to happen in the first place, were it not for the clowncil's myopia and incompetence.
posted by Frostbrand @ 5:19 PM
8 Comments:
At 8:51 AM,
Anonymous said…
Towards the end of Copeland's budget presentation, after he was done with his PowerPoint, he briefly, and quietly mentioned something about increasing the funding to the legal defense fund. I wonder by how much?
At 9:39 AM,
Anonymous said…
And lets not forget potential litigation based on the City's clear violation of PELRA in reorganizing the departments as a result of the department heads attempt to organize a union.
At 11:02 AM,
Frostbrand said…
A report from one of our readers on location suggests that the closed session was about the COPAR lawsuit.
At 11:30 AM,
Anonymous said…
How many lawsuits are we up to now? Wasn't preventing litigation one of Diana's big objectives? Way to go, Diana!
At 4:39 PM,
Anonymous said…
Pretty soon, the budget will be so far in the hole that they'll need to "reorganize" everyone, and let Copeland handle the entire government. At night he can don his crimefighting gear and hop from roof to roof as an overweight caped crusader. Then during the day, he can answer phone calls at City Hall, while simultaniously creating the city budget, drafting proposals and fighting off the hordes of lawsuits with a silver pen.
At 12:37 AM,
Anonymous said…
Note that the League of Minnesota Cities Insurance Trust covers all the cost of lawsuits after the deductible is met. Kantrud does not work for the League Insurance Trust. They select their own lawyers for these cases.
At 1:48 AM,
Frostbrand said…
Oh, well I feel all better now. As long as the bills are all going to be covered by insurance, let 'em go to town! Open meeting law violations, PELRA violations, civil rights violations, police raids on the liquor stores of Little Canada to steal booze and throw open-bar parties at City Hall...why not?
:)
At 4:16 PM,
Anonymous said…
On a serious note, the reason I brought up the insurance issue is that it is a fact that when insurance companies get involved in issues, the insured (ie. the city) loses control over the litigation.
For example, if I get into a car accident and I get sued, my insurance company hires a lawyer to defend the claim. The insurance company can fight all the way to the US Supreme Court, or they could settle, or do anything in between. I have no control over what the insurance company does. Because they are an insurance company, they do what is in their best interst.
The League of Minnesota Cities Insurance Trust is much the same. They call the shots. Sometimes they fight things in court not because they care about what Maplewood has to say, but because they want to fight on a point to defend cities in general.
Then we all have to be aware that a lot of these lawsuits address issues of discretionary immunity. That can be a topic of another thread...
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