From the InBox:
BUZBEE SAYS ‘BE ALERT’ OF FALSE ADVERTISING
Tony Buzbee announces intention to file suit against Sylvester Turner, Clear Channel
On April 5, 2019, Mayor Sylvester Turner unveiled the new Alert Houston promotional campaign, which is ostensibly being funded through a grant received from the Texas Office of Emergency Management. According to Turner, Alert Houston is “a service that helps educate us… about severe weather conditions, road closures, and other incidents with potential public safety impact.” The purported goal of the campaign is to encourage Houstonians to sign up to receive emergency alerts through the system. Part of the campaign includes putting Turner’s smiling face on 27 billboards across the City of Houston.
The billboard locations, along with radio ad space, were donated by Clear Channel Outdoor. Clear Channel has been lobbying the city to allow digital billboards within city limits and has also worked to convince the city—specifically the Mayor—to allow the relocation of billboards that would otherwise be removed due to the City’s billboard policy. According to Buzbee, “City Hall in Houston is for sale, and this is more proof of that. Rather than promoting public safety, these billboards do nothing but promote this failed mayor.” Buzbee will be filing a petition, through his lawyer, in Harris County District Court against Clear Channel Outdoor and Sylvester Turner for violations of campaign finance laws, which stipulate that “civil penalties can be imposed for illegal campaign contributions” and corporate donations, such as these billboards and ad space from Clear Channel, to political campaigns are strictly illegal. “The value of this illegal and unreported campaign donation will easily exceed a million dollars. If they really cared about public safety, why put this mayor’s picture that takes up more than half of the space on the billboards? This mayor doesn’t care about public safety—if you need proof of that just look at how he has failed us with inadequate police protection and laying off firefighters. It’s time to end the blatant corruption at City Hall,” Buzbee said.
I love how aggressive both Tony Buzbee and Bill King are campaigning against the corrupt Sylvester Turner. By the time the election rolls around, no Houstonian will be able to say that they didn’t know about Turner’s corruption.