Yesterday, Governor Newsom issued Executive Order N-29-20 (the “Order”), superseding portions of last week’s Executive Order N-25-20, related to California’s open public meeting laws.

This Order clarifies that local and state legislative bodies are not required to provide “at least one publicly accessible location from which members of the public may remotely observe and offer comment,” subject to certain notice requirements.

The Order continues to authorize local and state legislative bodies to hold public meetings via teleconferencing and make the public meetings accessible telephonically or otherwise electronically to all members of the public who wish to observe and address the local or state body.

Meetings by teleconference will satisfy all Bagley-Keene and Brown Act requirements so long as the local and state bodies do the following:

• The body must implement a procedure for receiving and swiftly resolving requests for reasonable modification or accommodation for disabled individuals, consistent with the Americans with Disabilities Act, in favor of accessibility; and
• The body must advertise that procedure each time notice is given of the means by which members of the public may observe the meeting and offer comment, consistent with the notice requirements below; and
• The body must give advance notice of the time of, and post the agenda for, each public meeting according to the timeframes required by the Bagley-Keene Act or the Brown Act; and
• At the same time it posts the meeting time and agenda, the local or state body must also give notice of the means by which members of the public may observe the meeting and offer public comment, whether by teleconference call-in number or otherwise. Should the means of public observation and comment change, or for any meeting agenda that was posted before this Order was issued that did not provide notice of such means, a body can meet this requirement by posting notice of such means on its website.

These requirements will apply only during the period in which state or local public health officials have imposed or recommended social distancing measures.

As before, this new Order continues to urge state and local governments to “use sound discretion and… to adhere as closely as reasonably possible” to the requirements of California’s open meeting laws as the state continues its efforts to address the COVID-19 pandemic. The full text of Executive Order N-29-20 may be found here.

If you have any questions or concerns, you are welcome to contact the offices of Churchwell White at (916) 468-0950, or email Douglas White at doug@whitebrennerllp.com or Nubia Goldstein at nubia@whitebrennerllp.com.