Former member seeks injunction to halt Boise City Council from ‘conducting business’

Lisa Sánchez, a former Boise City Council member, is asking Idaho’s 4th Judicial District Court to intercede on her behalf and prevent the council from doing business without her. A decision is expected in the coming days.

A motion seeking a preliminary injunction, filed on April 17 by Sánchez’s lawyer, Wendy Olson, argues that Sánchez has suffered “irreparable injury” as a result of losing her seat and that the appointment of Latonia Haney Keith to fill the District 3 vacancy was illegitimate.

Sánchez filed a lawsuit against Boise after Mayor Lauren McLean announced earlier this month that Haney Keith would be appointed to fill the seat until after the November elections.

Sánchez was elected by District 3 voters in 2021. However, when she moved to a new apartment in January, she inadvertently moved out of her district. When Boise lawyers learned that she no longer lived in her district, they concluded she had vacated the seat and could no longer serve on the council.

Since then, Sánchez has moved back into District 3 and demanded that the mayor reappoint her. Sánchez applied — and was a finalist — to be reappointed to the seat when McLean solicited applications earlier this year, but the mayor chose and the council confirmed Haney Keith. Sánchez’s demand culminated in the lawsuit filed this month.

The motion asks the court to prevent “the City of Boise from conducting business without Plaintiff Sánchez and ordering the City of Boise to reinstate Plaintiff Sánchez to the city council position from which she was unlawfully removed.”

At a Wednesday hearing, Olson clarified that the relief her client is asking for would be to preclude the City Council from acting, but not the entire municipal government.

“City council members are not fungible,” Olson said.

In response, lawyers for Boise argued in filings that it was Sánchez’s own actions that caused her to lose her seat, and said granting her request would stop the government from doing its work. A lawyer representing the city, Daniel Williams, also argued that requiring Boise to reappoint Sánchez could, if she eventually loses her case, “call into question” council decisions made by a person “with no legal right to sit on City Council.”

Williams also disputed how Sánchez lost her seat. Olson has repeatedly said that the council had no legal basis to “remove” Sánchez. By contrast, Williams argued that no one removed her — rather, she “vacated” her seat when she moved out of the district, even though she did not intend to.

“This wasn’t a mystery, this wasn’t that difficult,” Williams said at the Wednesday hearing. “We’re here because of plaintiff’s own doing.”

Williams included in his court filing a 1986 letter written by Idaho Deputy Attorney General Robie Russell to the mayor of Spirit Lake explaining that the AG’s office believed a city council member had vacated his seat by moving out of the town.

Williams also noted that Sánchez did not file her lawsuit or motion for a preliminary injunction immediately, but rather waited until this month — after she wasn’t appointed.

Another city filing included the minutes from a council meeting in 2021 that approved the map of geographic districts, as well as minutes from a meeting last year that created the new council districts. Sánchez voted to approve both maps.

A 2020 Idaho law required Boise to switch from at-large districts to geographic districts.

In 2021, Boise hired a consultant to draw a map with districts. In 2022, the city created a citizens commission to redraw the boundaries once more, which resulted in a new map for this year’s elections. That map replaced the district that covers the North End and Northwest Boise — District 3 — with a new District 6, which has somewhat different boundaries at its southern edge.

The address Sánchez moved to in January was within the future District 6 but outside of the current District 3.

Days after learning of her mistake, Sánchez moved to an address inside District 3.

Williams’ filing notes that when Sánchez was informed that her initial move placed her outside of her district, she told other council members, “No, you’re right, I messed up.”

In a filing, Sánchez said that her City Council salary was her only income, and that she has also lost her medical insurance and state retirement benefits.

A spokesperson for McLean declined to comment. Sánchez referred the Statesman to her court filings.

District Judge Derrick O’Neill, who presided over Wednesday’s hearing, said he expects to make a decision on the request for an injunction in the coming days.

At the start of the hearing, O’Neill noted that before becoming a judge he was a partner at Williams’ law firm, Jones Williams Fuhrman Gourley. He said he no longer has any connection to the firm.