The past eight years have been controversial ones for former Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton. This week, a court ruled that his impending trial for fraud can proceed to Harris County. This decision concludes the end of considerable effort on Paxton’s part to keep...
Creative Representation For Governmental Entities
Firm News
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...
Do youth advisory commissions make a difference?
Meterorological summer begins today: June 1 and runs until August 31. This is not to be confused with astronomical summer which is from June 20 to September 22. Meterorological summer is usually the sunniest, hottest time of year. It is also the time when teens are...
What’s the point of having laws?
Any parent of a toddler knows that in any given situation, the question "Why?" is first and foremost, and sometimes annoying. When it comes to why we have laws, the answer seems obvious, "Because." Enough said. However, taking a deeper dive into the question of the...
A municipality by any other name…
In Texas we do not divide our counties into townships. Instead we have cities or municipalities that are either incorporated or unincorporated. It can get confusing when different words are used to mean the same thing. You call it a what? Other areas of the U.S. also...
Is a meeting in session any time a quorum is present?
The short answer is no. There are, when you think about it, many occasions when a quorum of members may be present; either at an event related to or wholly unrelated to government process. Three times when a quorum is not a meeting For precise language about this...
The uncanny history of Monopoly
No, this is not a post about the Sherman Antitrust Act or the FTC. It's about the game Monopoly, and how conventional wisdom about the game's origins can be misleading. Two different inventors According to the book The Monopolists: Obsession, Fury, and the Scandal...
Municipal law has been around since medieval times
Municipal law—those laws relating to a city, as opposed to a state, nation or many nations— can be traced to medieval times. As far as we can ascertain the city of Freiburg im Breisgau was one of the first urban areas in Europe to institute municipal laws. These laws...
What is a referendum, anyway?
You hear it all the time; that a school board is trying to pass a referendum. You see it on your voting slip. People might ask you, are you for the referendum or against it? Some of us are profoundly involved in the referendum process. To us, it can be a real...
How Covid-19 affected city population trends
There are many reasons that might prompt someone to move to or from a city. Before the advent of the pandemic the three top reasons for a move according to Livability.com were for family reasons and: To get a new home or a better home To have their own home or...