Taxpayer-funded lobbying among cities and counties is a conflict of interest, creating significant barriers to enacting conservative fiscal policy, which has led to a recent push to ban the practice, according to the owner of a political consulting firm.
“It seems to be a one-way street,” Macias Strategies CEO Luke Macias said. “Cities and municipalities have seemingly been on one side of the political aisle when it comes to this type of policy. Cities, large or small, are often advocating for bigger government across the board.”
According to Ballotpedia, taxpayer-funded lobbying is when a city, county, or school district pays lobbying firms or associations for political causes, such as property tax reform, which could potentially affect homeowners who are locally levied.
Macias Strategies CEO Luke Macias
| lukemacias.com
“Whether Republican, independent or Democrat, across the board, taxpayers don't believe that lobbying is a proper use of their tax dollars especially people who are finding it hard enough to cover their property tax bill,” Macias told the Lone Star Standard. “When they find out that their dollars are being used on issues like property tax reform, it makes them pretty frustrated with local governance. If we are able to ban it this session, it will be a win for the property taxpayer guaranteed.”
Sen. Bob Hall (R-Edgewood) filed a bill Tuesday that, if enacted, will ban cities, counties and school districts from hiring lobbyists with taxpayer revenue to advocate against laws that could potentially benefit homeowners statewide.
“City councils often receive the agenda that they're supposed to set from the Texas Municipal League, which has been a longtime advocate against transparency measures and also have been staunch opponents to any and all property tax reform and relief that have been proposed by the Legislature,” Macias said in an interview. “The truth is that any efforts that restrict the rights of these cities to impede on the liberties of their citizens are often things that the cities are against.”
Provisions of the bill include:
Local governments are permitted to hire an individual or organization to monitor legislation in the interest of keeping local officials educated and informed.
“If a city wants to hire an employee whose job it is to communicate certain things with other elected officials they can but that's different than hiring high-powered lobbyists in Austin and paying them hundreds of thousands of dollars, then having them advocate against taxpayers and then turn around and use some of that money to donate to the legislators who helped kill property tax reform and relief,” Macias said.
Only public money is prohibited from being used for lobbying purposes.
“Most mayors, county judges and school board members have the cellphone [number] of their state representative and state senator,” Macias said. “It's not hard for them to reach out and have their voice heard through the process.”
The bill encourages local officials to communicate directly with their state representatives and senators.
“A lobbyist is somebody who's just significantly benefited off of his connections in the legislature and local governments are able to use that lobbyist by paying him hundreds of thousands of dollars to exert his influence to try to kill legislation that benefits taxpayers,” Macias said. “Then that lobbyist turns around and uses some of that money to donate to legislators, Republican and Democrat, that help them advance a more liberal agenda.”
