In an Oct. 8 tweet, Plano City Councilman Shelby Williams urged voters to pressure candidates running for public office to pledge their opposition to taxpayer-funded lobbying.
"I'm releasing the names!" Place 5 councilman Williams said in the Twitter post. "Has YOUR candidate taken the pledge to ban taxpayer-funded lobbying, where your elected officials use YOUR money to pay lobbyists to lobby your other elected officials against you?"
Williams issued the challenge shortly after he took the pledge and became one of more than 50 elected officials who "strongly oppose any governmental jurisdiction from hiring contract lobbyists, directly or indirectly, to lobby the Texas Legislature or another governmental jurisdiction," according the pledge website.
Williams' Twitter post
| twtwitter.com/ShelbyForPlano
"We urge all Texans to help ban taxpayer-funded contract lobbying, and encourage local elected officials and their staffs to directly represent Texans’ local interests before the legislature," the pledge continues.
Williams also has called for a ban on taxpayer-funded lobbying, according to a statement he released Oct. 10. He went on to say that taxpayer-funded lobbying has gone on for a long time.
"Tell YOUR elected officials and candidates that you want them to join the list of legislators and candidates below who have taken the pledge to ban the practice of taxpayer-funded lobbying, where your elected officials use YOUR money to pay lobbyists to lobby your other elected officials against you," Williams said in the statement. "For years and years, many local elected officials across Texas have deceived you about your property taxes, raising them consistently and telling you they weren't responsible.
"All the while, they’ve used your tax dollars to pay lobbyists in Austin to convince your legislators to keep the property tax gravy train moving full steam ahead," he continued. "This is as swampy as it gets, and the elected officials and candidates below [who have signed the pledge] are saying, 'Enough is enough!'"
Other elected officials who have signed the pledge include District 30 State Sen. Pat Fallon (R-Prosper), running for the District 30 seat in the U.S. House; District 67 State House Rep. Jeff Leach (R-Plano); District 70 State House Rep. Scott Sanford (R-McKinney); and District 89 State House Rep. Candy Noble (R-Allen).
Plano City Council races are nonpartisan.
Williams is no stranger to issuing challenges to others. In July, he urged people to donate blood shortly after he made his own donation.
Williams, father of three who has lived in Plano since 2003, has represented Place 5 on city council since June of last year when he defeated then-incumbent Ron Kelley in a general runoff, taking more than 53% of the vote. Kelley had held the Place 5 seat for about four years.
Williams' term ends in 2023.
