Imagine the San Antonio city council is set to vote on a new zoning regulation that is anticipated to raise the property value of small businesses along the River Walk. Ray Smith is a city councilman who is considering voting in favor of the new regulation. While...
Creative Representation For Governmental Entities
Year: 2018
Adopting social media communications requires legal diligence
Blaring sirens that alert the public to emergencies remain foundational in many communities for reaching the people about need-to-know news. Social media serves as an adjunct method for quick dissemination of information to large populations. But many cities...
Paying for court-ordered public works
How's your city's infrastructure? Is it something you are proud of, or is it something of a sore spot aesthetically and financially? Do you even know what we're talking about when we refer to infrastructure? According to at least one city planning educator, the word...
Recall elections: A legal course requiring due process
Someone once said, "All politics is local." And nothing hits so close to home as municipal level politics. The normal cycle of things has elections, initiatives and referendums occurring on a regular schedule in compliance with applicable laws. On occasion, however,...
Going on a rampage is not always a bad thing
Readers unfamiliar with our firm might be a bit surprised by our claim that we practice "rampage law." It's an understandable reaction; the definition of rampage being, according to Webster's, an outbreak of violent, raging behavior. That is not what we practice....
Minimize legal flashback risk over employee firings
Most of the people working for Texas government offices are solid employees, fulfilling their duties as effectively as they can or the system allows. Every once in a while, however, a worker fails to hit appropriate metrics. If it happens once, civil service policies...
What are penalties under Texas Open Meetings Act
In previous posts, we focused on requirements of the Texas Open Meeting Act (OMA), and the attention to detail required to ensure that processes and procedures are in place to ensure that government activities are conducted legally and transparently. In this post, we...
Ways to avoid government transparency law violations
Fostering the rights of the public to hold elected and other public officials accountable is crucial for the ongoing success of society. Because of that, all the states in the U.S. have adopted laws dictating the actions of government bodies regarding the formation of...
Knowing what constitutes nepotism can prevent it
Nepotism has ancient roots, and so does criticism of the practice. Texts going back eons disparage as unethical the grant of favors to close relatives by those in positions of power. Despite that long-standing disapproval, nepotism remains such a major concern that...
United States Supreme Court Rules In Favor Of Local Governments
For years, businesses have been able to skirt the taxation power of local governments when selling goods online. Those days are over.In the case Wayfair v. South Dakota, the Court held that local governments could indeed impose sales tax on companies who did not...