Sunshine Coalition reports wins, losses in 2025 legislative session

EDITOR’S NOTE: Your Texas Press Association is a founding member of the Texas Sunshine Coalition, as well as a cornerstone of the coalition’s legislative efforts. The following is a report on the 2025 legislative session from Laura Prather of Haynes & Boone, who represents both TPA and the coalition. Please note her comments stressing the importance of shoring up support in the Texas Senate, as well as chronicling troubling trends by government entities to stall public information requests. It’s important that TPA members help address those issues during the interim between legislative sessions. Thank you!

Mike Hodges. mhodges@texaspress.com

Donnis Baggett, dbaggett@texaspress.com

Dear Texas Sunshine Coalition,

As we arrive at the end of the legislative session, we have some positive outcomes to report. First, thanks to everyone in the Sunshine Coalition for standing together for open government. Many of you testified in person, submitted written testimony, signed in supporting bills, spoke with legislators and spread the word about our transparency initiatives. Our strength as a coalition is building at the capitol, and that sets the stage for future good work!

Now, here’s an update on our Sunshine Coalition bills and others that relate to our platform. 

The best news is the passage by both the House and Senate of HB 4219, the TPIA required response bill by Rep. Giovanni Capriglione and Sen. Judith Zaffirini. It has been sent to the governor. This is the legislation requiring governments to respond to TPIA requestors, even if there are no responsive records or when there’s been a previous AG ruling allowing withholding of those records. This is a really important step in making government officials more accountable and keeping requestors from being ignored. The bill includes a complaint process for requestors who don’t get a response and consequences for governments found to have violated the provision.

Some Sunshine Coalition organizations got involved in initiating and/or supporting other positive open government bills that were not formally among our coalition’s initial agenda, but which passed and have been sent to the governor. Fortunately, there are several to recognize:

HB 4214 by Rep. Pat Curry, requiring the AG’s office to maintain a publicly accessible database listing governments’ current public information request addresses.

HB 3711 by Rep. Giovanni Capriglione, expanding investigation options for Open Meetings Act violations to include potential investigation assistance by the AG’s office and state law enforcement.

HB 2520 by Rep. Ann Johnson, to include schools district boards of managers where there’s been a state takeover to be covered by the Open Meetings Act.

HB 1522 by Rep. Stan Gerdes, requiring a public meeting notice to be posted three business days beforehand instead of 72 hours and requiring a copy of a budget with the posting if a budget is to be considered in the meeting.

Unfortunately, the following Sunshine Coalition bills did not make it through both chambers, but several passed the House. Clearly, we’ve got more work to do in the Senate to encourage support for open government - a good subject to discuss in the interim:

HB 2248, by Rep. John Smithee, (SB 824 by Sen. Mayes Middleton) allowing for recovery of attorneys’ fees in certain Texas Public Information Act lawsuits. PASSED THE HOUSE; NO HEARING WAS SET IN SENATE BUSINESS & COMMERCE COMMITTEE.

HB 3719, by Rep. Todd Hunter, (SB 1293 by Sen. Johnson) restoring dates of birth to public records to allow for accurate identification of people who have common names. PASSED THE HOUSE; NO HEARING WAS SET IN SENATE BUSINESS & COMMERCE COMMITTEE.

HB 4991, by Rep. Terry Canales, (SB 1295 by Sen. Nathan Johnson) requiring open government training for outside attorneys hired by governments to handle Public Information Act requests. PASSED THE HOUSE; NO REFERRAL TO A SENATE COMMITTEE.

HB 4990, by Rep. Canales, (SB 1294 by Sen. Johnson) codifying the AG hotline and establishing a more formalized TPIA complaint process. MADE THE HOUSE CALENDAR, BUT TIME RAN OUT BEFORE IT COULD BE PASSED.

HB 4218, by Rep. Capriglione, (SB 50 by Sen.  Zaffirini) requiring release of electronic information in searchable-sortable spreadsheet format. PASSED THE HOUSE DELIVERY OF GOVERNMENT EFFICIENCY COMMITTEE, BUT DID NOT MAKE A HOUSE CALENDAR.

SB 1130, by Sen. Mayes Middleton, (HB 4987 by Rep. Canales) allowing mediation in TPIA cases. DID NOT RECEIVE A HOUSE OR SENATE HEARING.

SB 1291, by Sen. Johnson, (HB 5585 by Rep. John Bryant), allowing declaratory judgments 

in TPIA and TOMA lawsuits. DID NOT RECEIVE A HOUSE OR SENATE HEARING.

And on defense, there were some significant open government victories this session. The following bills that would have severely undermined the Public Information Act or removed important information from being TPIA accessible did not pass:

SB 986 by Sen. Paul Bettencourt, which would have allowed governments to decide on their own to withhold information without seeking an attorney general ruling, passed the Senate but did not receive a House committee hearing.

SB 2680, also by Sen. Bettencourt, would have prevented TPIA requestors from filing a lawsuit to compel the release of information until after - in some cases long after - an attorney general ruling has been issued on the request. This bill passed the Senate B&C committee but did not come up for a full Senate vote. 

SB 781 by Sen. Phil King,  and HB 2486, which would shield more police officer information from the TPIA, both were killed on points of order in the House in the session’s final days.

As always, thanks for your support throughout the session! After the dust settles, we will regroup and figure out what to prioritize moving forward. One trend we are already seeing that will need to be addressed is a new tactic of governmental entities (oftentimes after asking for clarifications and moving the deadlines as a result), then providing a cost estimate and requiring payment up front, then seeking an AG ruling! If you are seeing this, please let us know and keep track of these examples. FOIFT will be keeping a running database of this tactic to be able to present to the legislature next session.

Thanks and take care,

Laura Prather