In response to a series of actions resulting in a lost sales tax, the Woodland Park public school district has filed a complaint against the city of Woodland Park alleging a violation of Colorado’s Open Meetings Law.

The complaint, filed March 18, specifically alleges that city council members went into an executive session without following the proper procedure to do so during a special meeting on March 10.

Before the City Council’s vote to repeal the 1.09% sales tax earmarked for Woodland Park RE-2 schools, Mayor Kellie Case announced that they would be adjourning into executive session followed by a motion by Mayor Pro Tem Catherine Nakai “for the purposes of receiving legal advice on specific legal questions” from the city attorney and “for determining positions relative to matters that may be subject to negotiations.”

After returning from the executive session, the council unanimously voted to repeal the sales tax.

In reversal, Woodland Park City Council kills sales tax for public schools

In their complaint, the district alleges that the council failed to specify what they planned to discuss in executive session and that doing so wouldn’t have compromised the purpose of the session. They added that this prevented the school district from knowing what exactly was discussed.

While the Open Meetings Law allow all local government bodies to conduct executive sessions that are closed to the public, they can only do so after announcing the topic for discussion during the meeting. The topic should be generalized enough so that it doesn’t nullify any confidentiality.

The school district argues that they were not granted enough detail regarding the council’s discussions on the sales tax during the meeting since they voted to repeal it upon returning to the public meeting.

Before the vote, each council member addressed the public with a statement explaining the reasons. Council member Teri Baldwin resigned from the council immediately following the meeting.

When reached by The Gazette, Case declined to comment since the litigation is ongoing. The school district’s attorney Bryce Carlson named in the complaint did not answer Gazette inquiries by print deadline. 

This is not the first mention of legal repercussions following the council’s vote. Last month, The Gazette acquired a series of emails between the two governmental bodies’ legal representatives debating the legality of the council repealing the tax.

Woodland Park City Council advances effort to repeal sales tax for public schools

RE-2 attorney Brad Miller wrote to Councilmember Jefferey Geer that their intergovernmental agreement prevented them from revoking the tax without an action in court for specific performance. City Attorney Geoff Wilson argued that the city’s plenary legislative power and the state constitution allowed them to do so over the agreement.  

The district is seeking a judgment declaring that the city council violated its rights under Colorado’s Open Meetings Law and the executive session to be a public meeting and an order ensuring that they properly conduct executive sessions going forward.