Get Full Government Meeting Transcripts, Videos, & Alerts Forever!
Get email alerts on the Ethics Deposition Motion topic
No spam. Unsubscribe anytime.
Wausau Ethics Board votes to meet in closed session to consider depositions in complaint involving Mayor Doug Denny
Summary
The Wausau Ethics Board voted to go into closed session to discuss a respondent's motion to compel depositions of City Attorney Anne Jacobson and City Clerk Caitlin Bernardi in an ethics complaint involving Mayor Doug Denny; the board said it would reconvene afterward in open session if action were needed.
The Wausau Ethics Board voted to meet in closed session to consider a respondent's Motion to Compel the depositions of City Attorney Anne Jacobson and City Clerk Caitlin Bernardi in a pending ethics complaint involving Mayor Doug Denny.
The move came after the chair read the board's authority and the policy context for the ethics code, noting its consistency with chapter 19 of the Wisconsin Statutes. The board said it was invoking the closed-session exception for conferring with legal counsel about litigation strategy under section 19.85(1)(g) of the Wisconsin Statutes.
Board legal counsel Eric Larson and the respondent's counsel, Attorney Andrew Erlinson, were listed as present at the start of the meeting. The chair moved that the board meet in closed session “for the purposes just stated,” and a board member seconded the motion. The clerk then conducted a roll-call vote; members recorded as voting yes included Dexter, Hassler, DeVos and Kearns, and the chair announced the motion passed. The board then recessed to a private room to hold the closed session and said it would reconvene immediately afterward in open session if necessary to take any actions arising from the closed session.
No further substantive details about the depositions, scheduling, or any decisions made in closed session were announced in the excerpt of the meeting transcript provided. The board did not state a date for any subsequent public action on the matter in the portion of the record available.
The meeting record identifies the parties and officials involved in the motion: Mayor Doug Denny as the respondent named in the complaint; City Attorney Anne Jacobson and City Clerk Caitlin Bernardi as the officials whose deposition testimony the respondent sought to compel; and attorneys Eric Larson (board counsel) and Andrew Erlinson (respondent's counsel) as counsel present. The board framed the closed session as limited to conferring with legal counsel about litigation strategy under the cited statute and reiterated an intention to return to open session to take action only if needed.
