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El Paso City Council voted 7-0 on Feb. 23 to delete an item on the city meeting agenda that called for the city of El Paso to join as a plaintiff with Alpine, Rockport, Wichita Falls and Pflugerville and a list of individual local government officials in a lawsuit asserting the Texas Open Meetings Act chills cities’ constitutional right to free speech.
A week earlier, on Feb. 16, Beaumont City Council unanimously passed a resolution in support of the state’s open meetings law.
In passing the resolution, Beaumont, like El Paso, expresses its disagreement with the cities’ lawsuit, which was filed Dec. 14 in U.S. District Court, Western District of Texas, in Pecos.
The lawsuit names the State of Texas and Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott as defendants and asks for the court to declare unconstitutional the criminal penalty provisions in the Texas Open Meetings Act.
The actions by Beaumont and El Paso follow a motion filed in response to the lawsuit. On Feb. 2, Texas Solicitor General James C. Ho, on behalf of the State of Texas and Attorney General Abbott filed the motion, calling for the cities to be dismissed from the lawsuit, for three reasons:
(1) cities are creatures of the state so they cannot sue the state,
(2) cities are not citizens and therefore have no constitutional rights, and
(3) because the cities themselves are not subject to the criminal violations of the Open Meetings Act, they have no standing to challenge them.
The city of Big Lake, also named as a plaintiff, voted to withdraw from the lawsuit in December, a few days after the cities filed their lawsuit.
The Texas Municipal League has been actively engaged in promoting the lawsuit, while Texas Press Association, Texas Daily Newspaper Association, the Texas Association of Broadcasters and The Freedom of Information Foundation of Texas are working together in support of the constitutionality of the Texas Open Meetings Act as currently written.
The 15 individual plaintiffs who joined Alpine, Rockport, Wichita Falls and Pflugerville in the lawsuit are members of city councils.
They are: Diana Asgeirsson, Angie Bermudez, Jacques DuBose, James Fitzgerald, Jim Ginnings, Victor Gonzalez, Russell C. Jones, Mel LeBlanc, Lorne Liechty, A.J. Mathieu, Johanna Nelson, Todd Pearson, Arthur “Art” Reyna, Charles Whitecotton and Henry Wilson.
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Messenger Staff
Publisher
Micheal Hodges
Editor
Laura King
For questions or corrections please call the editor at 512-477-6755 or email lking@texaspress.com.
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© Texas Press Messenger, 2011 (ISSN 1521-7523). Published monthly by Texas Press Service, a business affiliate of Texas Press Association. Periodicals postage paid at Austin, Texas, and additional mailing office, USPS 541-440. Printed by Hood County News in Granbury, Texas.
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