Photo by Noah Dawson
Amarillo City Council voted 4-1 today to pass their taxpayer funded lobbying priorities. The vote, which came after the item was pulled from the agenda last month due to the priorities themselves not being listed in the agenda packet, came with further controversy today due to the fact that the item was incorrectly listed on the agenda.
The error was noted towards the beginning of today’s meeting by Mayor Ginger Nelson and City Secretary Stephanie Coggins. “On the face of the agenda, we had an error in calling it the ‘2023/24 Texas Municipal League legislative policy.’ This is actually for the city’s legislative agenda.”
Dismissing concerns regarding the error on the agenda, Mayor Pro-tem Fred Powell noted that “this will be, like, the fourth week that we’ve pushed it.”
Councilman Cole Stanley pushed back on this point, asking Mayor Nelson if there were “any time constraints” on the item, to which the Mayor stated “it’s our agenda, there’s not, like, a legislative police that say your homework is late.” Still, despite the lack of a time constraint, the majority on the council did not seem to think the error was enough to push the item to the next meeting, with all members other than Cole Stanley voting for the item.
There may have also been a further error in the wording of the motion made to pass the item, with Mayor Pro-tem Freda Powell making the following motion:
“I move to approve resolution number 09-13-22-1, which is adopting the policy recommending for inclusion in the 2023/2024 City of Amarillo legislative policies.”
The motion, which was seconded by Councilman Eddy Sauer, is distinct from the erroneous wording describing the item on the agenda and the wording describing the item on a memo included in the online agenda packet.
On the agenda, the item is described as “a resolution adopting State and Federal legislative priorities for the 2022/2023 calendar years.” On the memo in the agenda packet, the item is described as “a resolution adopting State and Federal legislative priorities for the 2022/2023 calendar years.” It is not immediately clear if the wording of the motion as stated is sufficient for passage of the city’s 2022/2023 legislative priorities.
To read more about the taxpayer funded lobbying priorities of the city, read our article on the priorities published yesterday.