Critics say stem cell panel skirting the law; Board didn't give proper notice of meeting, they say

Even before its first meeting, the board being created to direct California's $3 billion stem cell program is stirring up controversy about whether it is complying with the state's open-government rules.

Terry Francke, general counsel of a Sacramento public interest group called Californians Aware, urged state Attorney General Bill Lockyer to delay the inaugural meeting of the stem cell board, scheduled for Friday in San Francisco.

In a letter to Lockyer, Francke gave his "strong endorsement" of a protest filed by Charles Halpern, an independent public interest lawyer in Berkeley who is alleging the official agenda and public notice for the Friday meeting fail to comply with the state Bagley-Keene Act, which mandates open meetings of public agencies.

Halpern previously had tried to win a seat on the board, known as the Independent Citizens Oversight Committee. Although that didn't happen, Halpern said he still intends to make his views known as the stem-cell enterprise gets under way.

Halpern asserted that planners of the Friday meeting did not provide enough advance notice, gave only cursory descriptions of agenda items, provided no...