Note: The following was sent as an email to Mayor Ginger Nelson, Mayor Pro-tem Fred Powell, Councilman Eddy Sauer, Councilman Howard Smith, and City Manager Jared Miller as an email. The mayor and councilmembers included voted to approve the city’s taxpayer funded lobbying agenda despite the item not appearing on the agenda. Councilman Cole Stanley was the only member of the council to vote against the item.
I am writing to express my deep concern regarding the fact that the council decided to approve the city's taxpayer funded lobbying agenda despite the major error on the agenda. To anyone who had only read the agenda and not the entire agenda packet, they would not have known that the city would be taking up the controversial item. As I mentioned in my comments today during the meeting, I myself may have missed the fact that discussion of the item was planned if not for the fact that I read the full agenda packet. It is preposterous that the city should expect members of the community to take the time to read through a 300 page document just to find out what the council is planning to take action on just because the city made a mistake. Furthermore, the agendas provided to the public at city hall as they entered the council chamber today also contained the error while not including the supplemental materials provided only online.
To put it bluntly: This city council voted on and approved an item that was not on the agenda. You went around concerned citizens. I know several people who, after finding out late last night or early this morning, had concerns about the item but who could not rearrange their whole day at the last minute to study the item, prepare remarks, and show up to speak. I personally had several substantive concerns regarding the item which I wished to make heard before approval, but I made the mistake of using my time pointing out the mistake and hoping that the council would do the right thing by delaying the item. I have learned my lesson and will not make the mistake of assuming this council is capable of doing the right thing in the future.
Further, I am also concerned with the way the motion to approve the item was worded. The wording of the motion was "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." Even if modifying the wording of the motion to try to distort the item on the agenda into the item that was meant for the agenda were legal, I do not see how the wording of the motion made was actually sufficient to pass the intended resolution, which is titled "A RESOLUTION OF THE CITY COUNCIL OF THE CITY OF AMARILLO ADOPTIONG [sic] STATE AND FEDERAL LEGISLATIVE PRIORITIES FOR THE 2022 AND 2023 CALENDAR YEARS." At the very least, the motion that was made seems to preclude lobbying for the priorities listed by the city until January 1st, 2023.
Also, I would take issue with the idea that it was appropriate to use a modification of the item listed on the agenda to approve the city's legislative priorities. But, don't take my word for it. Here is City Manager Jared Miller's own words from August 16th, where he clearly expresses his view that items recommended to the TML are meant to be far less controversial than the city's own full list of priorities:
"We're also going to be talking about TML, Texas Municipal League legislative policy recommendations, which are very typically only going to be things that are things that every city would get on board with because TML will only sponsor things or only endorse things that they don't have cities arguing with each other about, so these are going to be things that are very basic."
This to me is similar to an issue raised earlier this summer in a hearing for Alex Fairly's lawsuit against the city, where the city used a fairly open reading of case law regarding agendas and the Texas Open Meetings Act, at least in relation to the slightly more strict reading of case law supplied by Fairly's legal team. While I am not a lawyer, it seems to me that even applying the city's more lenient standard used in that hearing would make the legality of today's action doubtful.
I get that members of the council were apprehensive about pushing the item back again, but the city made a mistake. It is not the fault of concerned citizens, and they did not deserve to have their opportunity to make their voice clear railroaded by a council too impatient to make sure things were done correctly. I understand mistakes happen, and, given the controversial nature of taxpayer funded lobbying as well as several of the specific items on the list of priorities I hope this was simply a mistake, but it would have been a very small price to pay to move this item back to the next meeting.
Noah Dawson
