The California Court of Appeal recently addressed the adequacy of the phrase “evaluation of performance” in an agenda prepared pursuant to the Brown Act and determined that the School District did not violate the Brown Act. [Duval v. Board of Trustees of the Coalinga-Huron Unified School District, 2001 WL 1382509.]
The Brown Act, at Government Code section 54957, allows local agencies to hold closed meetings to consider “the appointment, employment, evaluation of performance, discipline, or dismissal of a public employee.” The Board of Trustees of the Coalinga-Huron Joint Unified School District issued agendas for two different meetings that listed closed sessions to evaluate the interim superintendent’s “performance.” Plaintiff, Joe Duval, claimed that the School District violated the Brown Act because it went beyond mere “evaluation of [the interim superintendent’s] performance,” when it discussed the form used to evaluate the interim superintendent’s performance and took action to appoint the interim superintendent as the superintendent.
In answering Plaintiff’s claims, the Court of Appeal focused on the issue of the degree of specificity with which an agenda must disclose actions to be taken in a closed meeting. The Court of Appeal rejected the argument that the phrase “evaluation of performance” should be viewed in the very narrow sense of a formal, periodic review of the employee’s job performance. According to the Court, in the context of section 54957, the phrase “evaluation of performance” broadly extends to an employer’s consideration of an employee’s job performance, even if the review involves particular instances of job performance rather than a comprehensive review of such performance. Furthermore, “evaluation” includes consideration of the form and criteria for such an evaluation, the process for conducting the evaluation, and other preliminary matters related to an employer’s discretion in evaluating a particular employee. We do not believe this would be true when considering the evaluation form, criteria and process for a general group or class of employees.