He argued the redevelopment should have been dealt with as an open workshop to allow earlier community feedback.
Instead information on planning was presented at the briefing, with councillors expressing concern about the loss of 55 carparks and about where the carparks could be made up.
"All this is in a vacuum. We have these briefings but everyone else is in a void ... It is not ideal."
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But with only Cr Curach and another survivor of the former council, Catherine Stewart, voicing strong opposition to the volume of information being discussed confidentially, he has proposed a fall-back position. Briefings, with an indication of what they were about, should be added to the list of meetings publicised in the council's weekly bulletin, he said.
Cr Stewart said that every now and then briefings included matters that should be kept confidential but on the whole they should be open.
"It is good to engage with the community at the front end rather than further down the track." She said the downtown waterfront's waka Maori project was a good example of a briefing that should have been an open workshop.
Cr Curach said another example of where the public should have been notified earlier was last year's cost-saving proposal to shorten swimming pool hours.
If there have been 80-plus private meetings since October 2013, that is over one a week. That's totally unacceptable and an extremely disappointing trend in an environment when there is a greater need for transparency.
Earlier feedback from aquatic groups meant it would never have made the draft 2014-15 Annual Plan. More recent examples were CBD parking and events.
Mayor Stuart Crosby said most of the council favoured the briefings, which excluded the public and the media.
However, a list of briefings planned for next month would be put to the council today to see which ones could be transferred into the open.
Mr Crosby said he had no problem supporting Cr Curach's idea to list briefings. He said the number of briefings had dropped dramatically since the first 12 to 14 months of the new council when most were held to bring members up to speed. The Western Bay District Council and Bay of Plenty Regional Council held confidential briefings in the early phases of getting their heads around an issue, he said.
The council decided at its retreat last November to consider opening up briefings on a case-by-case basis but none had been declared open so far.
Seven of the remaining eight councillors contacted for comment by the Bay of Plenty Times defended confidential briefings.
Steve Morris said they were for staff to gauge whether enough information had been provided. They were not used to debate an issue, so that what came out in the public decision-making meeting was a fait accompli, he said.
Cr Bev Edlin defended the confidential briefings, saying the main thrust of them had been to background councillors and provide the rationale for why things happened.
Now that they were up to speed and the 10-year plan was out for public consultation, thought should be given to opening them up, she said.
Former Tauranga city councillor Mike Baker described the number of secret meetings as a "disturbing" trend.
"I would question whether all of these meetings needed to be held in confidential sessions. If there have been 80-plus private meetings since October 2013, that is over one a week. That's totally unacceptable and an extremely disappointing trend in an environment when there is a greater need for transparency."
