[ad_1]
FREEHOLD — The Bradley Beach Borough Council did not provide enough notice of a special meeting that would have enabled disciplinary proceedings against former Bradley Beach police chief Leonard Guida, according to Superior Court Judge Owen C. McCarthy, who added that the short notice of the meeting did not comply with the Open Public Meetings Act that requires a notice to the public of 48 hours.
According to Judge McCarthy, the borough provided only a two-hour notice to the special meeting and didn’t provide proper Rice notification to Mr. Guida, which would have compelled the Council to notify Mr. Guida that they were discussing his employment specifically.
“The issue that I dealt with today was a narrow one that dealt exclusively with the Open Public Meetings Act, and I find it was not complied with,” Judge McCarthy said at the conclusion of the hearing at Monmouth County Superior Court.
In a lawsuit filed on March 13, Mr. Guida’s attorney, Charles Uliano, challenged the emergency meeting, which was held by Bradley Beach Borough Council members Al Gubitosi, Jane DeNoble and John Weber on March 3. That meeting, the Council members maintained, empowered them to initiative disciplinary matters involving the former chief. The meeting was held on a Sunday afternoon, and notice of the meeting was filed with this newspaper only two hours before the meeting took place.
Mr. Guida was present in court but deferred requests for comment following the judge’s decision to Mr. Uliano. In his filing, Mr. Uliano wrote that his client did not receive proper notice of the meeting of which he was the subject, that there was a lack of quorum at the emergency meeting due to conflicting interests with one of the Council members, and that any disciplinary action taken against the former chief is “moot” because he had already retired.
“We are happy with the decision. The judge followed the law,” Mr. Uliano said of the judge’s decision.
Mr. Gubitosi, Ms. DeNoble and Mr. Weber, who were not in attendance at the hearing but named in the lawsuit were represented by Michael R. Burns of Rainone Coughlin Minchello.
Mr. Burns argued that the Council held the March 3 “special meeting to enter into an executive session” because a later date would have put the Council past a 45-day window to vote on any disciplinary matters involving Mr. Guida, who was the subject of a highly critical report from the Monmouth County Prosecutor’s Office [MCPO] in which it stated he had become “an active hindrance” to the department he had led for 17 years. According to Mr. Burns, the contents of the report forced the hand of the council to, under emergency provisions, take action to pursue disciplinary action against the chief. Judge McCarthy did not share this opinion stating, “I don’t see the urgency. I think that’s one of my concerns, where is the importance and urgency here that the 48-hour notice was not complied with?”
“It went about as expected. The judge has a firm grasp of the Open Public Meetings Act, there are certain requirements that have to be met and if they are not met, you can’t act. Unfortunately there were some issues with how late the council got the MCPO report, and their timeframe with which to act,” Mr. Burns told The Coast Star.
[more_nw_cs]
Check out our other Bradley Beach stories, updated daily. And remember to pick up a copy of The Coast Star—on newsstands Thursday or online in our e-Edition.
[sub_CG]
[ad_2]
Source_link
