The Open Meetings Act (OMA); Municipal marijuana retail licensing process; OMA’s applicability to a city manager in selecting applicants & an informal review committee used to help him; “Public body” (MCL 15.262(a)); Pinebrook Warren, LLC v City of Warren; Herald Co v Bay City; Distinguishing Booth Newspapers, Inc v University of MI Bd of Regents

The court held that the city manager in this case was not required to comply with the OMA in conducting defendant-City’s marijuana retail license selection process because he was “not a public body in his own right and is not a public body by way of ordinance-based delegation.” The trial court found no OMA violation. The Court of Appeals reversed, applying Pinebrook. On appeal, the court disagreed with the Court of Appeals’ ruling and its application of Pinebrook to these facts. “A governmental entity can qualify as a ‘public body’ by one of two pathways: ‘Either (1) [it] satisfies the statutory definition of “public body” in its own right or (2) the entity is delegated authority from another public body.’” As to the first, individual government officials are generally “not ‘public bodies’ within the meaning of” MCL 15.262(a). The court addressed the second, the delegation pathway, in Booth. Its decision in Pinebrook “further refined the contours of” these pathways. The court concluded here that, pursuant to its decision “in Herald, the city manager does not himself qualify as a ‘public body’ in his ‘own right.’” It noted that “an individual may qualify as a ‘public body’ under the second pathway by way of delegation.” But without such delegation, “Herald dictates that an individual cannot be a ‘public body’ in his or her own right.” The Court of Appeals applied the second pathway here. The court disagreed, determining that it erred “in its initial conclusion that the ordinance awarded decision-making authority to the city commission. Rather, the ordinance gives the city manager the power to decide among applicants.” The court found that “the city commission has no role in selecting among applicants other than to approve or disapprove site plans. Thus, the Court of Appeals erred by concluding that the city commission delegated its authority under the marijuana ordinance to the city manager, thereby rendering him a ‘public body.’ Instead, [he] was ‘acting alone in [his] official work capacity pursuant to an independent grant of authority,’ and, therefore, was not subject to the OMA.” Further, the marijuana ordinance did “not itself qualify as a delegation of authority subject to the OMA.” The court reversed Part VI of the Court of Appeals’ judgment and remanded to the trial court for entry of summary disposition for the City.