Cases & Developments

Order vacating and remanding the District Court’s grant of partial summary judgment and dismissal. Plaintiff, the Attorney General for the State of Idaho brought claims against the Idaho Board of Education (the Board) alleging violation of the State’s Open Meetings Law (OML) following a series of meetings and communication regarding the approved proposal for the University of Idaho to purchase the University of Phoenix. The acquisition, which proponents referred to during negotiations as “Project Neptune” was approved by the Board during a public meeting in May of 2023, prior to which it held three executive sessions – in March, April, and May – that were closed to the public. The dispute centered primarily upon whether during the trio of executive sessions the Board was engaged in “preliminary negotiations” regarding the purchase and “in competition with the governing bod[y]” of another state, which is a recognized exception to the requirement that government conduct business in public under Idaho law. In addition, the plaintiff sought but was denied leave to amend the original complaint to challenge the adequacy of the notice given prior to the public meeting during which Project Neptune was approved. After a bench trial found no violation of OML, plaintiff appealed and argued the court incorrectly defined and applied legal standards in its rulings on discovery and summary judgment, and that in denying plaintiff’s motion to amend, it incorrectly found that his claim pertaining to the public meeting notice did not relate back to the original claims regarding the trio of executive sessions. The Supreme Court of Idaho reasoned that based upon “public policy objectives plainly expressed within [OML] coupled with the applicable canons of statutory construction” the trial court erred in its deference to Defendants’ subjective belief regarding potential competition with other states and applied an overly “expansive interpretation” of the phrase “preliminary negotiations” which “does not mean ‘all negotiations’ … [but] a phase of negotiations preliminary to final negotiations.” And although Supreme Court of Idaho agreed with the lower court’s conclusion that plaintiff’s challenge to the Board’s failure to file an adequate notice regarding the May 2023 public meeting was untimely, it found that plaintiff’s expanded challenge to the April executive session arose directedly from the original claims, and thus, related back. Accordingly, it vacated the trial court decision and remanded the case for further discovery prior to disposition on motion or at a trial on the merits.