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A.R.S. § 38-431.09

Declaration of public policy

Applied in 9 court decisions — leading case City of Prescott v. Town of Chino Valley (1990)

Most recently applied in Johnson v. Tempe Elementary School District No. 3 Governing Board (December 2000)

How often courts cite this section

19821990200030
citing decisions per year

Court decisions citing this, by year. The dip in the last several years is a data-coverage gap, not a real trend — our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so recent citations are undercounted.

A. It is the public policy of this state that meetings of public bodies be conducted openly and that notices and agendas be provided for such meetings which contain such information as is reasonably necessary to inform the public of the matters to be discussed or decided. Toward this end, any person or entity charged with the interpretations of this article shall construe this article in favor of open and public meetings.

B. Notwithstanding subsection A, it is not a violation of this article if a member of a public body expresses an opinion or discusses an issue with the public either at a venue other than at a meeting that is subject to this article, personally, through the media or other form of public broadcast communication or through technological means if:

1. The opinion or discussion is not principally directed at or directly given to another member of the public body.

2. There is no concerted plan to engage in collective deliberation to take legal action.

Official source: Arizona State Legislature. Reproduced from public-domain Arizona statutes; confirm against the official source for the current text. Not legal advice.