A five-member majority of the Honolulu City Council may have violated the state’s sunshine law by taking part in a lobbyist-paid trip to a rail transit conference in Washington, D.C. last week.

In addition, the attendance of the five council members and other city officials at a lobbyist-sponsored reception may have stumbled over ethics guidelines.

The travel expenses of at least two council members and several administration officials, including air fare, hotel, ground transportation and conference fee for Rail-Volution 2011, were paid for by a $22,000 gift from Pacific Resource Partnership, a pro-development lobby supported by the Hawaii Carpenters Union and its signatory contractors.

One additional council member was to join the group in Denver to view several examples of transit oriented development along its rail system, council minutes show. The gift of travel expenses was officially accepted and is treated as a gift to the city, rather than the individuals making the trip.

But Civil Beat’s Adrienne LaFrance reported last week that five council members, including council chair Ernie Martin, were at the PRP-sponsored reception in Washington during the conference.

The five were Martin, Ikaika Anderson, Romy Cachola, Breene Harimoto, and Ann Kobayashi.

The sunshine law prohibits more than two members of any public agency from meeting to discuss pending matters outside of a formally-declared public meeting. It specifically bars most informal gatherings at which issues pending before the agency are discussed.

According to the Office of Information Practices: “The Sunshine Law generally prohibits discussions about board business between board members outside of a properly noticed meeting, with certain statutory exceptions. While the Sunshine Law authorizes certain interactions between board members outside of a meeting, the statute expressly cautions that such interactions cannot be used to circumvent the requirements or the spirit of the law to make a decision or to deliberate towards a decision upon a matter over which the board has supervision, control, jurisdiction, or advisory power.”

While the law does not prevent council members from talking about the issues with private citizens, OIP advises caution in public settings.

For instance, four county council members cannot participate in a discussion at a neighborhood board meeting about a matter that is council business, even if the council members do not discuss the matter between them- selves. In OIP’s opinion, such an exchange is part of the discussion and deliberation process that can only take place in a properly noticed meeting.

The law does not apply to social gatherings, but only so long as “they do not discuss official business that is pending or that is reasonably likely to come before the board in the foreseeable future,” according to OIP’s “Guide to The Sunshine Law.”

Having five council members–an absolute majority of the council–attending a rail conference and reception where rail and related transit oriented development policies were the main topics of discussion would appear contrary to the law as summarized by OIP.

Further, OIP’s “Guide to The Sunshine Law” says site visits, such as the inspection of transit oriented development in Denver, would have to be considered public meetings and subject to the law’s notice requirements.

City ethics law prohibits city officials from soliciting or accepting gifts “if a reasonable person could conclude that the gift is intended to influence or reward the officer or employee in the performance of an official duty.”

Among factors to be considered, according to the Honolulu Ethics Commission, include whether the recipients take any official action affecting the donor and whether the gift benefits the city rather than the recipient. The law also allows accepting “small tokens of aloha, such as a lei or food to be shared with co-workers.”

It is unclear whether food and drinks at an upscale Washington restaurant provided by a pro-rail lobbying group, as described by Civil Beat, would pass this basic test.

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