By Noah Dawson, Associate Editor
Amarillo City Council is likely to pass a resolution outlining the city’s lobbying priorities at their upcoming October 8th meeting. While the resolution will likely contain the euphemistic title “2025 Legislative Priorities,” this is nothing but the first step in the taxpayer-funded lobbying process.
Our editorial board has repeatedly stood against the practice. We believe it makes a mockery of the protections for free speech found in both the Constitution of the United States and the Constitution of the State of Texas to take a person’s money then use it to bobby for political causes they may or may not agree with. Even in cases where a vast majority of taxpayers agree on an issue, it is better to put that money back in their hands to choose how they would like to use it.
Many have argued that it’s a practice necessary to compete in Austin. But, when examined more closely, it’s less of a competition and more of a race to the bottom. We could try to outspend Dallas, Austin, and Houston. But Amarillo’s budgetary well will dry out much faster.
Additionally, taxpayer-funded lobbying creates incentives for local governments to lobby against the interests of their own taxpayers. One common refrain you’ll hear is “local control.” That sounds great in theory until you ask what these local governments want local control over. In reality, much like “legislative agenda” is a euphemism for “lobbying agenda,” “local control” is all too often a euphemism for removing restrictions on increasing taxes. This isn’t a hypothetical either. For decades, the Amarillo Hospital District has not collected property taxes, but it is now looking at doing so in the near future. Under current state law, the district will have to call an election to approve reinstating a tax. However, the City of Amarillo is now considering using your tax dollars to lobby for a change in that law so that your taxes can be raised without you having a say.
We haven’t been alone: the Republican Party of Texas platform supports a ban on the practice. Locally, candidates from across the political spectrum have expressed opposition. When campaigning, the current members of Amarillo City Council ranged from skepticism to explicit opposition to taxpayer-funded lobbying.
When we asked about their stance in our 2023 voter guide, Don Tipps and Tom Scherlen were unequivocal in their opposition to taxpayer-funded lobbying. Cole Stanley, Josh Craft, and Les Simpson were all more measured in their responses. Stanley said he supports the city spending money on lobbying, though he felt it would be better to utilize revenues than property taxes. Craft said that “[s]hould it happen, the City must be very vigilant, and require full transparency to the citizens,” while Simpson said it “would have to be addressed on an individual basis.”
We implore Amarillo City Council to take bold action and terminate this practice.