Back door deals in Austin cost us hundreds of millions of dollars and hide police misconduct records.

I went to the City of Austin Prop. 1 and 2 amendments debate last night at the St. Edwards Campus and it shored up my feelings about the dire need we have for the Open Government amendment.

Austin is strangely unique when it comes to hiding police misconduct records.

More than 2,000 other Texas law enforcement agencies operate right now with police misconduct records open to the public, while here in Austin they are a secret.

How did that happen? A back door deal between city council members and City of Austin police.

Just like the hundreds of millions of tax dollars our city council members give to corporations in the dark shadows.

If you try to do a city request for information, as I have many times, you know it's nearly impossible to get a shred of just about anything.

The opponents (the folks that do the back door deals) say it will cost 30 million dollars. Not true. We found out weeks ago, when the judge had the city take the stand, that under oath the city said $30 million was not true.

We will save hundreds of millions of dollars when we let the sun shine in, where the massive tax giveaways usually take place in the shadows.

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