PHOENIX — State lawmakers are free to ignore laws they approved requiring public access to their meetings and there’s nothing that courts can do about it, the Arizona Supreme Court ruled Friday.
In a unanimous ruling, the justices acknowledged legislators applied the state’s Open Meeting Law to themselves. This law requires all meetings of legislative committees conduct meetings publicly so “all persons so desiring shall be permitted to attend and listen to the deliberations and proceedings.”
In fact, Justice Ann Scott Timmer said lawmakers also approved rules that are substantially similar.
