HiddenMysteries: Texas Mayor Openly Defies Texas Law to Deprive Citizens of Civil Rights

Dear Editor,

We have a severe competence problem in Coffee City. The city mayor determined that informing the citizens of council meetings on the city website (as required by law) is something he does not want to do.

In Monday’s council meeting he decreed to end the website on his orders. Good citizens want to know why? What is his objection of notifying citizens of public meetings? How did he claim dictatorial authority to end the city website? Why was there no motion on the floor and a vote of the council to determine the fate of the city website?

The mayor erred (for laymen that means lied) in claiming that the city website was not owned by the city. All one need do is look at the check registers for the early months of 2010 and locate the payment for around $80.00 where the city paid for the domain.

I went to city hall and inquired about the city police website several months back and was informed by the Chief of Police that it was not a city owned website but that citycoffeecity.com was a city owned website. A councilwoman was sitting in the room and confirmed the chief's answer was correct. So who is lying? The mayor or the police chief?

Citizens of the city ARE the city.. and we paid for that website! The mayor is acting like a juvenile delinquent that needs to be sat down in the corner by the teacher. This is unprofessional, infantile behavior, and only proves to businesses, newspaper journalists, and visitors to the city that Coffee City is the place to avoid. The only impression they could possibly get of the city leaders is that of borderline insanity.

The mayor is playing dictator over the citizens and council. He is not governing. He is playing hateful politics. He is not governing. He is violating statutes, codes, policies, ordinances, laws, and the constitution of Texas. He is not governing. He is perjuring his oath of office required by the constitution of Texas. He is not governing. A day of reckoning is overdue.

True to the mayor’s infantile rantings, the city website has been shut down. Below is the page that comes up on Aug. 9, after the Monday council meeting. However, the city still has a website. The city owns the domain, it has a website,... and must obey the law. It cannot be cancelled on the whim of an irresponsible bureaucrat.

The mayor has deprived me and deprived all the citizens of Coffee City due process when he refused to post council meetings and public meetings on the city website. Does he not understand that any or all acts of the council are voidable in Texas for failure to obey the Texas Open Meetings Act? Our civil rights have been denied to us under color of authority.

The Economic Development Corporation website has been destroyed also, I presume on orders from city Czar Tony Moore. I guess that doesn’t matter too much since the EDC refuses to post meeting notices also. Is this promoting good government or even a good city?

These are acts either proving incompetency or willful disobedience to the law, and raises further suspicion, if not proof, that this administration is working behind closed doors to keep their acts from view of the public. We citizens, however, are demanding transparency in ALL dealings of the city leaders regarding our city. We are demanding proper and legally required notices of all meetings on a city website.

L. Savage
http://cityofcoffeecity.org

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http://www.cityofcoffeecity.com/
http://www.coffeecity-edb.com

A governmental body must post an agenda that includes the date, hour, place, and subject of each
meeting. The agenda must be posted at city hall in a place readily accessible to the public at all
times for at least 72 hours before the meeting. In addition, for cities that have an Internet Web site:
(1) a city under 48,000 population must post meeting notices on the site...

Penalties for violating the Act range from having the action voided to the imposition of fines and
incarceration. Any action taken in violation is voidable and may be reversed in a civil lawsuit.
There are four criminal provisions under the Act, including: (1) knowingly conspiring to circumvent
the Act by meeting in numbers less than a quorum for the purpose of secret deliberations; (2) calling
or participating in a closed meeting; (3) participating in an executive session without a certified
agenda or tape recording; and (4) disclosure of a certified agenda or tape recording to a member of
the public. Upon conviction, fines may be up to $2,000, and incarceration may be up to six months.

Texas Municipal League (from their website)

Texas Local Government Code
§ 52.004. OFFICIAL NEWSPAPER.

(a) As soon as practicable after the beginning of each municipal year, the governing body of the
municipality shall contract, as determined by Ordinance or resolution, with a public newpaper of
the municipality to be the municipality’s official newspaper until another newspaper is selected.

(b) The governing body shall publish in the municipality’s official newspaper each ordinance,
Notice, or other matter required by law or ordinance to be published.

(NO notices of council meetings have been posted in the newspaper at all)

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ICANN records show that the domain cityofcoffee.com was registered to the city of Coffee City on Feb 3, 2010 though Go Daddy registrar.

ICANN Registrar:
GODADDY.COM, INC.
Created:
2010-02-03
Expires:
2012-02-03
Updated:
2010-02-03

Registrant:
City of Coffee City
P.O. Box 716
Frankston, Texas 75763
United States

Domain Name: CITYOFCOFFEECITY.COM
Created on: 03-Feb-10
Expires on: 03-Feb-12
Last Updated on: 03-Feb-10

Administrative Contact:
Coffee City, City of
P.O. Box 716
Frankston, Texas 75763
United States
(903) 876-3414 Fax --

Technical Contact:
Coffee City, City of
P.O. Box 716
Frankston, Texas 75763
United States
(903) 876-3414

Texas Mayor Openly Defies Texas Law to Deprive Citizens of Civil Rights

Tuesday, August 09 2011 @ 01:46 PM CDT