Print friendly
E-mail story
Tip Us Off
Comments
Share Article
Facebook
Twitter
Google+1
del.icio.us.
Digg!
Yahoo! Buzz
Diigo
google
newsvine
reddit
technorati
Yahoo!
MyspaceDavid Pritchett, one half of Santa Barbara’s most prominent populist power couple, submitted his resignation from the City of Santa Barbara’s Transportation and Circulation Committee (TCC), stating his continued service “presents an appearance of awkwardness if not even silliness” for his wife, newly elected councilmember Cathy Murillo. Murillo was just appointed as council liaison to that same committee. Pritchett has served on the TCC, the advisory body now taking the lead on safety improvements for the Milpas corridor, since 2006, and he has been an outspoken advocate of traffic-calming measures like bulb-outs and a supporter of alternative transportation. Last week, Pritchett sought to attend a committee meeting electronically from a hotel room in Atlanta, but City Attorney Steve Wiley emphatically deep-sixed that plan, arguing it violated the state’s open-government law known as the Brown Act. To comply with the Brown Act, Wiley said, members of the public would need to be able to physically enter Pritchett’s hotel room; the fact that the hotel was in Atlanta precluded that from happening, he said.
Last year, Pritchett moved to Atlanta temporarily to work as a federal biological consultant for proposed development projects in Florida. Since taking that job, he’s missed more meetings than he’s attended, even though he sought to rearrange his schedule to be back in Santa Barbara in time for the TCC’s monthly meetings. Those regular meetings, he said, have themselves been rescheduled to make it all but impossible for him to attend. Before serving on the TCC, Pritchett served for five years on the Creeks Advisory Committee. And two years ago, he ran for city council. Although he lost, he did far better than many expected, for which his wife — who ran that campaign — received much of the credit. Historically, there’s no precedent for a councilmember to have a spouse serving on a city advisory committee, and legally, there’s no conflict of interest. Even so, all parties involved concede it looks and feels weird. It was only a matter of time, Pritchett said, before he stepped down. The scheduling conflict, he said, accelerated that decision.
Previous Month
Comments
The fact that the public could see Pritchett on the same monitor as the rest of the committee members should have been sufficient. I really do not need to be able to reach out and touch a government official to have their meetings transparent.
Given Wiley's concern, if a committee meeting had an overflow audience, they'd have to cancel the meeting to find a bigger space because he doesn't consider TV screens acceptable.
Ken_Volok (anonymous profile)
February 2, 2012 at 6:33 a.m. (Suggest removal)
For those of us who regularly use video conferencing to conduct business, this doesn't seem like an unusual situation at all.
But maybe the Brown Act's concern is there might be a mobster holding a gun to the speaker just off-screen?
EastBeach (anonymous profile)
February 2, 2012 at 2:39 p.m. (Suggest removal)
Kudos to David for doing the right thing, if he is going to be a part time resident for a extended period then he should step down for that reason. He seems the type who will seek another opportunity for public service when he has the time and can find a spot that doesn't have a potential for someone to complain of a conflict of interest.
pointssouth (anonymous profile)
February 2, 2012 at 7:53 p.m. (Suggest removal)
Sensible to step down from the committee which he's not attending and to which his wife is the Council member liaison.
at_large (anonymous profile)
February 6, 2012 at 2:38 p.m. (Suggest removal)