Dear Supporter,

TexasBudgetSource.com is proud to bring you the latest news, research, and commentary on Texas transparency.

Remember you can always find new additions to School District, County and City budgets and check registers every quarter through this email newsletter and by checking TexasBudgetSource.com.

In this edition:

• YouTube - Center for Fiscal Policy Director Talmadge Heflin tackles the issue of open government.
• Publications & Commentaries - Read the Foundation’s newest publication, The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly: A Brief Overview of 2010-11 Budget, or the latest commentary, The 72 Hour Rule: Read the Bill, which gives a frank account of the lack of accountability in Washington.
• News Headlines - Check in here for the latest local headlines in transparency from across Texas.
• Feedback - We'd love to hear from you, drop us a line if you have a question or transparency tip.

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Publications & Commentaries

The Good, the bad, and the Ugly: A Brief Overview of the 2010-11 Budget

By Talmadge Heflin and James Quintero
The state’s new 2010-11 budget appropriates $182.3 billion in total spending, an 8.6 percent increase in All Funds appropriations over the previous biennium.

The budget includes $12.1 billion in federal funds from the American recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA), of which $6.4 billion was allocated for General Revenue spending and $5.7 billion was spent directly by state agencies. Read more…

The 72 Hour Rule: Read the Bill
By Kathleen Hartnett-White
When we elect people to serve in Congress, we send them there as our representatives. In exchange for giving them our authority to make national decisions, they have the responsibility to provide us with sufficient information so that we can provide feedback on their decisions and gauge how well they represent us.

Unfortunately, our current national leadership has scotched that understanding. Thousand page federal bills with trillion-dollar price tags rushed through Congress are becoming the norm, disturbing to many voters. Read More...

News Headlines

Harris County Attorney’s Office officials’ top-dollar moonlighting raises conflict of interest questions
Texas Watchdog
October 15, 2009: Should a lawyer employed full-time by the county, to do county business, be allowed to also represent other clients—sometimes in the same courtrooms in which he or she works on behalf of the county? What if the “other clients” include people who are suing, or being sued by, the City of Houston, the Harris County Appraisal District or even Harris County itself?

Texas law says yes. But Harris County Judge Ed Emmett wants the practice banned. And he’s willing to go all the way to the statehouse about it. Read More...

Pflugerville officials to fight transparency provision
Austin American-Statesman
October 15, 2009: Pflugerville council members voted unanimously Wednesday to join a lawsuit, yet to be filed, that will claim the Texas Open Meetings Act violates their free speech rights. Read More...

Stimulus dollars out there, somewhere: Web site to inform public is misleading about local allocations
Houston Chronicle
October 25, 2009: A Houston Chronicle review of the federal government's distribution of $787 billion in economic stimulus money approved by Congress found that the highly touted Web site designed to let the public know how much of their tax money is going to their home congressional districts is misleading and statistically unreliable.

Instead of reflecting where federal stimulus money is creating jobs in each congressional district, the Obama administration's recovery.gov Web site credits large blocks of stimulus cash as going to districts that are home to the government agencies that disperse the money — and not where the money is actually spent. Read More...