The preamble of the Texas Public Information Act says that the people who work for government agencies do not have “the right to decide what is good for the people to know and what is not good for them to know.” To hold public servants accountable for the decisions they make and the money they spend, “[t]he people insist on remaining informed.”
In the three decades since the TPIA was passed, the protections that ensure the people stay informed have significantly eroded. The rampant lack of transparency and accountability in our system fosters poor decision making, wasted money and resources, bias, and corruption.
Government agencies now use the well-worn strategies of disregard, delay, and deny – especially when it comes to government contracts. First, they ignore you. Then, if they respond, they wait until the last day of the legal response period, then ask follow-up questions to trigger a new time window. After they’ve exhausted all the time they can, they often deny the request and appeal to the Attorney General’s office for a ruling.
In recent weeks, TPPF experts have experienced the run around. First, Houston ISD refused to explain how and why it spent $8 million developing a bond proposal. Worse, TPPF only learned about the spending because an initial public information request revealed the hidden money, which would have been completely wasted and unknown had the district not resurrected the bond package. TPPF is awaiting a ruling from the Attorney General.
And just this week, Round Rock ISD refused to hand over documents explaining why it chose to approve a $5 million contract to a vendor who was neither the most qualified, nor submitted the most affordable bid. This denial, too, has been forwarded to the Attorney General on the grounds that revealing “pricing information” meets one of the exceptions in the Public Information Act.
This is an overly broad interpretation of the law. How can the public be assured the cost was worth the service if it can’t understand how the contractor arrived at the price?
The process has been degraded such that it violates the spirit and perhaps the letter of the law. All this points to the urgent need for reform.
This commentary is published on Thursdays as part of TPPF’s subscriber-only newsletter The Post. If you would like to subscribe to The Post, click here.