Everyone has heard of prosecutors. They are the attorneys who work for the state to take criminals off the streets. While most people have an idea of what prosecutors who work for the district attorney’s office do, fewer people probably know about the duties of...
Counsel for Texas municipalities
Handling non-agenda items in government meetings
The Texas Open Meetings Act (TOMA) allows members of the public who wish to address their local government to add items to the official meeting agenda. This is a positive way to involve residents in their local governments' decisions. Still, it can add too many issues...
What is the role of a city attorney?
As residents of Texas’s Gulf Coast cities go about their daily lives, few stop to think about their city’s laws and who helps create them. That is where a city attorney comes in. City attorneys play a major role in shaping the everyday lives of thousands – sometimes...
What is the Texas Tort Claims Act?
The question of liability is always present for most municipal entities. The piece of legislation that primarily deals with liability for local and state government entities is the Texas Tort Claims Act, or TTCA. Many everyday municipal workers are not familiar with...
What are some defenses to municipal liability claims?
In today’s litigious culture, municipalities have to worry constantly about lawsuits. From a visitor slipping and falling on public grounds to a car accident involving a state-owned vehicle, the threat of litigation is high. So is the cost of arbitration, mediation or...
Tug of war over Texas online sales tax
A simple change to the sales tax sourcing rule by the Texas Comptroller will go into effect later this year. Comptroller’s Rule 3.334 will redirect sales tax revenue from online purchases. Instead of going to the seller’s place of business, the revenue will go to the...
Texas city to help other municipalities learn from its drought survival
It started back in 2010 and lasted five years. The extreme drought that put a dry, dusty chokehold on Wichita Falls forced a number of changes in the lives of its residents. None of the changes were harder to swallow than the switch to Direct Potable Reuse (DPR) – a...
Texas county and petrochemical company settle lawsuit
A mid-March weekend two years ago was interrupted by a Saturday afternoon fire at Exxon Mobil’s Baytown refinery. News reports stated that the blaze was extinguished after about four hours. Details of that incident were forgotten by area residents less than 24 hours...
