During a closed meeting Tuesday of the Granby City Council, a contractor entered the session.
After the contractor, Brandon Hankins, owner of CK Construction, entered the small conference room where the council conducts closed meetings, Newton County News editor Chad Hayworth, followed by Todd Higdon, a reporter with the Neosho Daily News, entered the closed session.
The council members were attempting to talk privately with Hankins. Some of the council members have been at odds with Hankins with what they say is a lack of progress on work at the Granby Community Building.
In turn, the city sent a letter to Hankins after the April 13 council meeting demanding that work he had been paid for be completed.
The contractor stated Tuesday that he wanted to talk to all the council members at once to clear up any misunderstanding about the project. Hankins noted to protect his business interests, he preferred to have the talk in private.
“I asked for (the meeting),” Hankins told the two reporters.
However, Missouri law doesn’t allow a public entity to hold private conversations except in limited circumstances, according to attorney Jean Maneke with the Missouri Press Association.
“My perception is what they did in that closed meeting was a violation of the exception, the exception is to meet alone to talk about what your strategy is, it is not to discuss litigation with the other side in closed session,” Maneke said. “That is not the intent of this exception to allow people who are litigants to discuss their litigation in a closed meeting.”
The council went into closed session under RsMo 610.021, the Missouri Sunshine Law.
After the reporters brought the matter at hand to the council, Hankins and the reporters were asked to step outside. The council discussed the matter and within a matter of a few moments, came back outside and went back into open session.
After the meeting, Granby mayor pro-tem Carol Sparnicht talked to the two newspapers. Sparnicht noted she was not aware that the council was possibly violating the law by trying to speak to Hankins privately.
“I always state that if I am doing something wrong, just be sure to let me know, because if I am doing it wrong, then obviously I don’t know that it is wrong,” she said. “I don’t do things wrong for general purposes.”
Sparnicht told Hankins that they could speak one-on-one with each other about the city’s concerns, which is allowed under the law.
