Last month the Texas Supreme Court limited the public’s right to know how private groups operating as chambers of commerce and economic development councils spend your tax dollars. Today, a most bizarre email from the campaign of Bill King came into my inbox.
On June 26 in a 6-3 decision with the majority opinion written by Justice Eva Guzman, the Texas Supreme Court decided the Greater Houston Partnership is not a “governmental body” for the purposes of the Texas Public Information Act and ruled the Partnership does not have to release the check registers sought by the requestor under the Act.
Under its 2007 and 2008 contracts with the City of Houston, the Greater Houston Partnership received quarterly payments of $196,250.00 contingent upon delivering reports to the City detailing the services rendered during the prior quarter.
Thanks to Justice Guzman though, the Greater Houston Partnership gets to keep THEIR books closed and keep secret how they spend your hard-earned taxpayer money.
So what’s with this bait and switch?
From the Bill King “Back to Basics” campaign:
The Greater Houston Partnership, Houston’s preeminent business group, issued a white paper on the City of Houston finances last Friday. It is a sobering, must-read work for anyone concerned about the future of our City. [Click here to read the report.]
This authoritative report raises many of the same concerns that I have been sharing with you since I first became alarmed about the City’s financial trajectory in 2007. It outlines the serious challenges facing the City financially, at a time when City Hall is collecting record tax revenues. In fact, the City will collect over $1 billion more in taxes and fees from Houstonians than it did just six years ago, while going an additional $3.3 billion more in debt during the same time.
These challenges will only become more acute with the recent downturn in oil prices.
While there are a number of reasons for the financial straits in which the City currently finds itself, the GHP report accurately shows that the principal driver is unsustainable pension promises previous mayors have made to City employees — something I have written about many times both in these missives and my column in the Houston Chronicle.
The report’s conclusion most succinctly states the challenge before us:
“What we cannot do is wait. The nature of these problems is such that the financial issues become much more difficult, and perhaps impossible, to resolve if the attempt at resolution is deferred (as the experience of other cities has shown).”
All I can say is “amen.”
So the GHP sought a way to keep THEIR books closed and THEIR finances hidden from public scrutiny but they expose Houston’s finances?
Will Bill King express “alarm” over how the GHP spends your hard-earned tax dollars?
All I can say is hypocrisy thy name is the Greater Houston Partnership.
Looks like we need to add the SurName to the 6 people on the “John-Roberts” Supreme Court of Texas. Eva Guzman-Roberts who’s campaign coffers have filled up with donations that appear to come from “Downtown Houston” and notably they won a big cover decision on the GHP case of hide and no-seek. Looks like we need to rename the existing 6 to a “-Roberts” since they literally legislated from the bench. CHIEF JUSTICE HECHT-ROBERTS, JUSTICE GREEN-ROBERTS, JUSTICE LEHRMANN-ROBERTS , JUSTICE DEVINE-ROBERTS, and JUSTICE BROWN-ROBERTS.
I believe that the Supreme Court got it right. A private organization is just that, private. The burden for disclosing the use of public tax dollars should be on the governmental agency that controls and spends those tax dollars, not on a private entity that simply enters into a contract. Otherwise, where do you draw the line? Should a citizen (or competitor) be able to inspect the books of any private business or organization that engages in business with the city? If there are questions about transparency and tax dollars, the responsibility should be with the government body who controls those tax dollars and enters into the contract, the elected leaders.
The problem is with the Open Records law. You will never get that information from the City because they will hide behind a privilege.
The problem with the Greater Houston Partnership is that they are a puppet for whatever Mayor is in control because of the Money they receive from the City. Remember that they were for the Rain Tax and the $410,000,000 bond issue that we all voted for in 2012.
I think the Greater Houston Partnership should have to disclose all the money they get from the City since their actions over the last 6 years cannot be differentiated between Mayor Parker and themselves.
Where were they when this commercial ran:
https://vimeo.com/52130710
I will tell you where they were at. They stood with the Mayor and Rodney Ellis. They wanted the Money.
The Greater Welfare Partnership argued they are not a governmental body as defined in the Government Code:
The Public Information Act applies to information of every “governmental body.” “Governmental body” is defined in section 552.003(1)(A) of the Government Code to mean:
(xii) the part, section, or portion of an organization, corporation, commission, committee, institution, or agency that spends or that is supported in whole or in part by public funds.
They took taxpayer money–a lot of it. So a portion of the Greater Welfare Partnership was supported “in part”.
Thanks for the link to the majority opinion. It was enjoyable and informative reading. I agree the the decision.
Horrible decision. Funny that a “conservative” Texas Supreme Court would ignore precedent and “conservatives” agree with the decision. I guess “conservatives” only call courts activist if they don’t like the decision.
It is a horrible decision. You take my tax dollars then I need to know how you spend them. The GHP is anything but a probusiness organization. They are a pro us organization. I agree with you.
I’m a fan of less government intrusion, less government control, and (in general) less government. After reading the decision, I’m not sure what the beef is. GHP is a private entity. They are, and should be, under no compulsion to expose their operations, just because they accepted a contract with the city, unless (and this is very important) their contract requires them to do so.
I agree the GHP doesn’t necessarily have anything but their own self-interest as a priority. But the question we need to be asking is: Why has the City of Houston, which has stunning financial problems, agreed to pay these yahoos almost a million dollars a year!?!? The problem isn’t the GHP, the problem is, once again, out of control, irresponsible, self-serving, spendthrift politicians. Why did the City sign a contract agreeing to pay this money without a mechanism to evaluate how it is being spent and the value of services received.
The problem here is the feckless idiots in City Hall. Asking the Supreme Court to clean up the mess is a lousy fix.
Fat Albert,
No one asked the Supreme Court to clean up the mess. The GHP asked the Supreme Court to ignore decades of precedent requiring entities that take money from government to open up their books for that specific spending. And the Supreme Court did. Horrible decision for those of us that want government to be transparent.
FAT,
I agree with you when you ask the question of why are we paying them anyway. You know when I was in Law School I was warned that bad fact make bad law.
David, I agree that we need transparent government. I also agree that when our government contracts with a private entity we need to make sure that said entity is honest and transparent about how that money is being used. But I agree with the Court that the solution shouldn’t be statutory but rather contractual. I’m not a particular fan of precedent, especially if the precedent isn’t particularly good.
The solution at this point is for the COH to terminate the current contract. Then, if the services provided are really essential (a dubious proposition at best) a new contract can be written with proper reporting requirements.
In the meantime somebody somewhere needs to be asking the hard question, namely – what actual value did the COH receive for it’s $1,000,000/year expenditure?
Another salient question: Is there actually an honest politician anywhere in the City of Houston?