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Judge orders PTC to halt secret meeting plan

By JOHN MUNFORD
jmunford@thecitizennews.com

The Peachtree City Council’s plan to use a secret meeting with attorneys for a shopping center developer and a homeowner’s association to negotiate design changes for the new Kedron Target store was closed down Friday after a legal challenge from The Citizen.

Fayette Superior Court Judge Christopher Edwards ruled that the law allowing government agencies to hold closed (secret) meetings for litigation purposes is to preserve the secrecy of attorney-client communications, known as privilege.

By including representatives of outside parties in the meeting, the city would no longer be protecting its attorney-client privilege and therefore could not meet in closed session and still comply with the Georgia Open Meetings law, Edwards ruled.

Edwards granted The Citizen’s request for a temporary restraining order to keep the council from meeting in private with anyone other than attorneys who represent Peachtree City, elected officials of Peachtree City or “employees of Peachtree City who have an attorney-client relationship to Peachtree City’s attorneys due to their employment by Peachtree City.”

Although city officials originally planned to hold the meeting with council and its legal representatives only, the Monday meeting slated for 6 a.m. was ultimately cancelled.

Laurel Henderson, an attorney representing Peachtree City, argued in a court hearing Friday that the secret meeting with the city council and the outside attorneys was needed since negotiations back and forth through the attorneys hadn’t proven fruitful.

A “face-to-face meeting,” it was hoped, would help settle the outstanding issues, Henderson told the court. She also argued that another Georgia law controlled the matter, one that requires negotiations on mediations to be conducted in secret.

Not allowing a secret meeting between all parties unfairly handcuffed the city in its ability to handle the legal matter, Henderson said.

“There is no doubt that democracy is difficult,” Judge Edwards said in ruling against the city.

The negotiations are to help settle issues raised in a lawsuit filed against the city by developer Faison Corporation. The Kedron Hills Homeowners Association was allowed to also join the lawsuit to protect the interests of its residents.

During Friday’s hearing, Judge Edwards denied a motion from Faison attorney George Rosenzweig to join the lawsuit filed by The Citizen over the secret meetings.

Rosenzweig argued he needed to protect his client’s interest, but Edwards noted that Faison isn’t subject to Georgia’s open meetings law since it is a private entity, not a government agency.

Edwards is also presiding over the lawsuit about the Target plan, which would also add more retail stores to the Kedron Village retail center in a third expansion of the shopping area. The Target store will be 125,000 sq. ft.

The initial concessions on the development plans drew criticism from residents in St. Simons Cove, another nearby subdivision that was not party to the lawsuit. They have complained to the council and produced a list of changes they’d like to see made to the plan.

The lawsuit between Faison and Peachtree City is still pending as the parties try to reach concessions under a consent order agreed to earlier this year.