Opinion: Council's outings disconcerting

Some St. Petersburg City Council members have developed such an affinity for each other that they should adopt the theme song from the old Patty Duke Show: "They laugh alike, they walk alike, sometimes they even talk alike."

Not only do they talk alike, they talk a lot, and in private. Council members James Bennett, John Bryan, Richard Kriseman, Virginia Littrell and Earnest Williams do lunch. Chairwoman Rene Flowers and Littrell have enjoyed morning strolls, and sometimes the whole crew jumps in Bennett's minivan and heads off to an event, Times staff writer Leonora LaPeter reported recently.

"This council travels as a herd," Littrell boasted. Yet it is such herd behavior that the state Government-in-the-Sunshine law has in mind when it prohibits elected officials from meeting outside the public eye. "The law, in essence, is applicable to any gathering, whether formal or casual, of two or more members of the same board or commission to discuss some matter on which foreseeable action will be taken by the public board or commission," according to the Florida Attorney General's office.

The council members deny discussing city business during their get-togethers. Although the subject matter sometimes wanders too close to city issues, Bennett explained. "You'll get started on something and you have to remind people, 'Hey, we can't talk about that,' " he said.

Yet it would be human nature for a group, sooner or later, to settle on the one subject they all have in common. No one can prove what public officials discuss in private, of course, and that is precisely why the council members should abide by the spirit as well as the letter of the law.

The members defend their togetherness by saying city residents were tired of the prior council's bickering. Most of that was caused by the invective of Kathleen Ford, and she is no longer on the council. Members are wrong if they think preordained happy-talk will substitute for spirited-yet-polite debate on city issues.

St. Petersburg City Council members should restrict their private time together. They may, by chance, run into one another at a social gathering, but planned lunches, walks and road trips create too much temptation. Soon enough, city residents could start wondering if city business is being conducted on the sly. And who would be able to say that it isn't?

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