Urbana Mayor Diane Marlin has been flip-flopping her position on Open Meetings Act (OMA) compliance in regards to public input.
On July 6th 2021, Marlin claimed that allowing remote public input, as the City Council had been doing for more than a year, would violate the OMA if the Council continued to allow it during in-person meetings.
At the April 4th, 2022 City Council meeting, the issue of remote public input was raised by Urbana resident Tracy Chong. Council members Shirese Hursey and James Quisenberry both issued nonsensical and insulting responses. Quisenberry claimed that remote public input would likely violate the OMA and that members of the public who raised the issue were ignorant to the legalities of the Open Meetings Act.
On April 8th, 2022 Check CU published an article that quoted Assistant Attorney General Shannon Barnaby as saying, “it is up to the discretion of the public body whether or not to allow public input remotely when holding in-person meetings.” This statement quite clearly demonstrates that Marlin, Hursey, and Quisenberry are squarely in the wrong. There exists no provision of the OMA which could, by any stretch, be interpreted to mean that remote public input is prohibited. This article was sent to the Urbana City Council members on the same date.
At the April 11th, 2022 City Council meeting, Mayor Marlin lied to the public and denied that she’d ever made her statements in July 2021.
At the April 18th, 2022 City Council meeting, the Mayor castigated Ms. Chong for pointing out the flip-flop. Marlin then tried to create a smokescreen around her lie: she dishonestly conflated a remote public input option with remote meeting attendance by the City Council members. Marlin also conflated an Illinois General Assembly bill with the issue of remote public (the two issues are unrelated).
Despite having been supplied a letter from the Illinois Attorney General’s Office on April 11th, Mayor Marlin continues to act as though remote public input would constitute an Open Meetings Act violation.
Video of Mayor Marlin lying to the public, intentionally distorting the issues, and gaslighting a member of the public for pointing it out, can be viewed here: