EDDINGTON, Maine — The Maine Supreme Judicial Court has denied an appeal by a Hampden earthworks company that sued Eddington over the way the town handled a proposed quarry project.
“They denied Hughes Bros.’s appeal,” town attorney Charlie Gilbert said Friday of the high court’s 14-page decision dated Jan. 14.
Hughes Bros. sued Eddington on April 1, 2014, alleging that the town held an illegal executive session attended by selectmen and members of the planning board, improperly withheld records in violation of the state’s Freedom of Access Act and enacted a mining moratorium illegally to block Hughes Bros.’s pending application to operate a quarry in town.
In January 2015, Superior Court Justice Michaela Murphy, presiding over the Business and Consumer Docket, ruled in the town’s favor, after earlier ordering officials to release some documents. Murphy found that the joint executive session was convened properly and the moratorium was enacted legally.
Hughes Bros. appealed Murphy’s ruling, and the town cross-appealed the judge’s order to release documents that town officials claimed were covered by attorney-client, work product and deliberate process privileges.
“We affirm the court’s judgment in all respects, and we write primarily to address the legality of the executive session,” Leigh I. Saufley, chief justice of the Maine Supreme Judicial Court, said in the decision.
The court determined that the executive session was legal, nothing in the law prevents a joint executive session and the moratorium was not approved in executive session, Saufley states.
In fact, the high court said the town’s steps were prudent.
“Although Hughes argues that any meeting related to legislative drafting should be open to the public, the FOAA was not designed to prevent a government body or agency from consulting privately with legal counsel about how to comply with the laws and regulations that govern the body’s or agency’s work,” Saufley said in the decision. “Indeed, it may be wise for a citizen board to consult with knowledgeable counsel regarding the board’s legal obligations — and the potential legal consequences of its actions — when preparing to conduct important municipal business.”
The state’s Freedom of Access Act “contains no prohibition against municipal boards simultaneously entering into executive session to jointly consult with counsel about how to comply with the law in carrying out their respective duties,” she said. “The bare fact that boards share in the advice of counsel during a combined executive session does not offend the FOAA and demonstrates prudent fiscal management.”
Bangor attorney William Devoe, who represents Hughes Bros., said Tuesday in an email that “Hughes Bros. was disappointed that the court spent so little time considering the company’s equitably vested rights argument, for which we thought the evidence was quite strong. Beyond that, Hughes Bros. is simply reviewing its options at this point.”
Town Manager Russell Smith said Tuesday that he was not surprised by the high court’s decision. The town’s cross-appeal was dismissed in the decision.
Hughes Bros. filed an application with the planning board in early 2014 to get permission to operate a ledge quarry on Fox Hill that would start out as a 5-acre operation and possibly could grow to 20 acres. A retroactive, six-month-long moratorium on quarries was passed in April 2014 at a special town meeting. The moratorium was extended for an additional six months.
BDN writer Judy Harrison contributed to this report.