The Caddo Commission meets today for its administrative conference. An agenda item is the pending litigation by Louisiana Attorney General Liz Murrill against the Commission and the seven Democrat commissioners.
It is expected a settlement will be reached with a "slap on the hands, don't do this again" admonition by the AG. And then the Commission will pay with taxpayer dollars attorney fees to Jerry Harper representing the seven Democrats and John Nickelson representing the five Republican commissioners who were not names as defendants.
Interestingly enough the seven Democrat commissioners will most likely be allowed to vote on the settlement. Thus, their vote will relieve any personal liability they may have incurred in the litigation. Casual observers smell a conflict of interest.
An interesting aspect of any settlement is the issue of voice voting versus electronic voting. The AG filed an amended petition alleging that electronic voting violated state law. Needless to say, these pleadings caused much consternation by public bodies who almost universally vote electronically.
The settlement on the alleged violation of the Open Meetings Law seemingly is a slam dunk. However, what terms if any deal with voice voting versus electronic voting is the big unknown.
Stay tuned.