Texas Must Shine a Spotlight on Government Accountability

Shining a light on government to hold it accountable is hardly a new idea. In fact, Texas was a national leader in this realm for more than 40 years.Sadly, the flow of public information in this huge state is slipping from the sunshine into the shadows.Some state leaders have been dimming the lights, ensuring that even the most basic information about our government is getting more difficult to uncover. Who, really, is that candidate running for office? How are our hard-earned tax dollars being spent? Remember the Alamo, and how do we track its restoration money?Texas Supreme Court rulings favoring secrecy plus inexcusable inaction in the state Legislature have severely weakened the Texas Public Information Act, a law rooted in the open government reform era of the early 1970s. For many years it was one of the strongest transparency laws in the nation.  Continue reading...