GA Appeals Court Affirms Dismissal of Opens Meetings Act Claim Against County Commission

This post was authored by Matthew Loeser, Esq.

In 2012, Defendants voted against hearing Sweet City Landfill, LLC’s plan for a landfill project at a public meeting. In this case, Sweet City appeals from a trial court order granting the motions to dismiss filed by Appellees Elbert County, The Board of Commissioners for Elbert County, Bill Daughtry, and Russel T. Lyon, Horace Harper, Harold Reynolds, Frank Eaves, Kenneth Ashworth, Freddie Jones, Lee Vaughn, and Chris Alexander, individually and in their official capacities as Members of the Board of Commissioners of Elbert County (collectively, the “County Commission”).

On appeal, Sweet City argued the trial court erred in granting immunity to the named County Commission defendants because Sweet City properly pleaded bad faith and intentional misconduct, thereby removing the shield of immunity provided by OCGA §51-1-20(a). The court first noted that the immunity provided under OCGA § 51-1-20 applied regardless of whether the nature of the person’s actions at issue were ministerial or discretionary. Here, Sweet City’s complaint failed to allege that any resolution, rule, regulation, ordinance, or other official action was adopted, taken, or made by the County Commission at a meeting which was not open to the public in violation of the Open Meetings Act. Since the County Commission’s actions were within the scope of its official duties, and Sweet City did not plead sufficient facts to show bad faith, the court held the County Commission was entitled to statutory immunity.

Sweet City next contended that the trial court erred in finding OCGA § 9-3-96’s tolling provisions did not apply to a violation of the Open Meetings Act and in finding that Sweet City failed to prove fraud or concealment. Specifically, Sweet City argued that OCGA § 9-3-96 tolled the six-month statute of limitation within the text of the Open Meetings Act since the alleged fraudulent actions taken by the County Commission in 2012 were not discovered until 2018. According to the statute’s plain meaning, however, the outer limits of when an action for alleged violations of the Open Meetings Act was required to be brought was six months. Furthermore, the statute did not indicate that the time for bringing a claim could be tolled. Even assuming that tolling was possible, however, neither Sweet City’s complaint nor its brief on appeal alleged with any particularity that the County Commission made any fraudulent statements or representations or that it committed any fraudulent actions. Accordingly, the trial court did not err in finding that Sweet City could not avail itself of the tolling provisions of OCGA § 9-3-96, and dismissed Sweet City’s Open Meetings Act claim.

The court next addressed Sweet City’s claim that the trial court erred in taking judicial notice of matters outside the pleadings, and failing to convert the County Commission’s motion to dismiss to a motion for summary judgment and to provide Sweet City with an opportunity to conduct discovery and submit evidence. While it was undisputed from the record that the trial court considered matters outside the pleadings in rendering its decision and did not give Sweet City the requisite 30-days notice to prepare evidence in opposition to the motion, Sweet City failed to argue how it was harmed by the trial court’s decision to review those documents in question. Accordingly, the court held the deficient notice in this case was not a reversible error.

Lastly, in both the 2013 lawsuit filed by Sweet City and the present case, Sweet City alleged that the actions taken by the County Commission regarding Sweet City’s landfill project were unconstitutional and in violation of county rules and procedures. While Sweet City raised the Open Meetings Act claim in the present suit, which it claimed did not accrue until April 24, 2014, the trial court did not apply res judicata to that claim but dismissed it on other grounds. Additionally, the subject matter in the prior suits was found to be virtually the same, as both cases revolved around how the County Commission’s actions deprived Sweet City of its rights to develop property in Elbert County for a landfill project. As the merits of Sweet City’s allegations against the County Commission were previously adjudicated, and Sweet City had not identified any action by the County Commission subsequent to events of the earlier case which deprived Sweet City of any rights relative to the proposed landfill project, the court found the prerequisites for res judicata were met in this case. The court therefore held the trial court did not err in dismissing Sweet City’s as applied claims on res judicata grounds.

Sweet City Landfill, LLC v. Lyon, 2019 WL 5588790 (GA App. 10/30/2019)