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Sukh Kaur defends the merits of her \u201clist\u201d during a City Council meeting in June. Credit: Screengrab \/ COSA Government Channel<\/p>\nSukh Kaur defends the merits of her \u201clist\u201d during a City Council meeting in June. Credit: Screengrab \/ COSA Government Channel<\/p>\n
In a lengthy Facebook post that included emails exchanged by San Antonio policymakers, citizen watchdog group InfuseSA accused District 1 Councilwoman Sukh Kaur of violating the Texas Open Meetings Act by convening with five other council members to form a consensus outside of a public meeting.<\/p>\n
The alleged violation occurred prior to a June 18 council meeting, during which Kaur and a majority of council voted to delay discussion of a proposed 33% rate hike by San Antonio Water System (SAWS),\u00a0according to emails and text messages between Kaur and other involved parties obtained by InfuseSA.<\/p>\n
Kaur declined to comment on InfuseSA\u2019s document dump.<\/p>\n
\u201cI am staying focused on District 1 resident requests and concerns during this tough budget season,\u201d Kaur told the Current via text message.<\/p>\n
However, two former San Antonio City Council members, Adriana Rocha Garcia and Greg Brockhouse, appear to agree with InfuseSA\u2019s assessment of Kaur\u2019s actions. Even so, Brockhouse told the Current he doubts the councilwoman will face any legal repercussions.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis is what [City Council members] do routinely,\u201d said Brockhouse, a two-time mayoral candidate who ran on a populist platform. \u201cAnd they find new and creative ways to do it.\u201d<\/p>\n
University of Texas San Antonio political scientist Jon Taylor also expressed alarm after reviewing the documents obtained by InfuseSA.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf it walks like a duck and talks like a duck \u2026\u201d Taylor told the Current. \u201cWhen you have people who are not part of the process, like Rocha Garcia, saying it was a walking quorum, then that suggests to me that it was. But, proving it and prosecuting it are two totally different things.\u201d<\/p>\n
Listing council concerns<\/strong><\/p>\n Before the June 18 meeting on the proposed rate increase, Kaur met with five colleagues to discuss concerns about SAWS\u2019s proposed rate hike, according to emails InfuseSA obtained through an open records request and shared in the group\u2019s Facebook post<\/a>. In those emails, Kaur listed the council members\u2019 concerns and sent them to top SAWS officials.<\/p>\n \u201cWe are sharing a letter drafted by several colleagues that outlines challenges we have collectively experienced, along with specific requests we ask to be addressed prior to any approval of any rate increase,\u201d Kaur wrote in a June 17 email to SAWS CEO Robert Puente and board member Jelynne LeBlanc Jamison. \u201cWe look forward to partnering with you to move a rate increase forward once these requests have been met.\u201d<\/p>\n Kaur CCed five council members on the communication: District 2\u2019s Jalen McKee-Rodriguez, District 4\u2019s Ric Galvan, District 6\u2019s Edward Mungia, District 7\u2019s Marina Alderete Gavito and District 10\u2019s Marc Whyte.<\/p>\n In a separate email, Kaur arranged to have lunch with Puente at Pearl-area restaurant Down on Grayson on June 17 to discuss the concerns outlined in the letter.<\/p>\n Under Texas state law, government bodies are\u00a0prohibited from conducting votes out of public view and from deliberating\u00a0in secret ways that could influence the outcome of public business. Such violations are considered an illegal \u201cwalking quorum\u201d if policymakers hold substantive deliberations outside a posted meeting.<\/p>\n The question in this case is whether the council members identified in the email based their votes on the SAWS rate hike on the list of demands Kaur sent to SAWS.<\/p>\n Although Galvan was CCed in Kaur\u2019s email and was invited to her lunch with Puente at Down on Grayson, the councilman ultimately voted in favor of allowing SAWS to undertake the rate increase.<\/p>\n Similarly, District 9 Councilwoman Misty Spears, who wasn\u2019t included in Kaur\u2019s email, was among those who voted to delay discussion of the proposed rate hike until October.<\/p>\n SAWS is seeking the increase, which could run residential water users an additional $200 annually, to make long-needed repairs to its infrastructure and pipes.<\/p>\n \u2018You can\u2019t do that\u2019<\/strong><\/p>\n In text messages, former District 4 Councilwoman Rocha Garcia, who now serves on the SAWS board, expressed concern that Kaur may have violated the Texas Open Meetings Act.<\/p>\n The day after council voted 6-5 to postpone discussion of the proposed rate hike, Rocha Garcia texted Puente\u2019s chief of staff, Jaime Castillo, to voice her concerns about the exchange, according to messages obtained by InfuseSA.<\/p>\n \u201cNo wonder they\u2019re all squirming,\u201d Rocha Garcia wrote. \u201cAnd if [City Attorney] Andy [Segovia] tries to say it\u2019s not a walking quorum, I think he may be wrong \u2026 . I don\u2019t see how it wouldn\u2019t be a walking quorum.\u201d<\/p>\n Rocha Garcia continued: \u201cIt\u2019s the equivalent of walking and building support for or against something.\u201d<\/p>\n Rocha Garcia served on City Council\u2019s Ethics Review Board for nearly three years.<\/p>\n Kaur\u2019s document came up several times<\/a> during council\u2019s June 18 public meeting, and some on the dais, including Mayor Gina Ortiz Jones and District 3 Councilwoman Phyllis Viagran, said they were unaware it existed.<\/p>\n Complaint filed<\/strong><\/p>\n After the June 18 discussion of Kaur\u2019s letter, Joseph Brantley \u2014\u00a0who runs the muckraking Facebook page Citizen Veteran Journalists of Bexar County<\/a> \u2014\u00a0filed a formal complaint against Kaur with the Bexar County District Attorney\u2019s office.<\/p>\n \u201cThe complaint does not ask your office to assume a violation occurred,\u201d Brantley wrote in his June 24 complaint. \u201cIt asks your office to review whether the reported conduct satisfies the elements of Texas Government Code \u00a7 551.143, including whether the series of communications collectively involved a quorum and whether participating members knew the communications would constitute deliberation once a quorum was involved.\u201d<\/p>\n Officials with the Bexar County DA\u2019s office said in an emailed statement that Brantley\u2019s complaint didn\u2019t \u201cprovide a sufficiently reliable basis to support the filing of criminal charges.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cCriminal allegations requiring factual development are generally filed with the appropriate law enforcement agency for investigation and, if supported by the resulting evidence, only then submitted to our office for prosecutorial review,\u201d the DA\u2019s office said.<\/p>\n Contacted for comment by the Current, former District 6 Councilman Brockhouse said he believes Kaur organized a walking quorum in violation of Texas state law.<\/p>\n \u201cShe had to have taken these deliberations to write the memo,\u201d Brockhouse said. \u201cYou can\u2019t do that; it\u2019s plain as day.\u201d<\/p>\n He continued: \u201cIt\u2019s very telling because in her email, she wrote \u2018from several council members.\u2019 She knew exactly what she was doing because whenever I\u2019ve written a memo to anybody, I list the members that are on the memo with me. Copying or CCing people for knowledge is different than \u2018This is coming from us.’\u201d<\/p>\n If found guilty of violating the Texas Open Meetings Act, a misdemeanor, Kaur and any alleged co-conspirators could face fines of up to $500 and up to six months in county jail.<\/p>\n Even so, Brockhouse said it\u2019s unlikely that anything will come of the complaint. <\/p>\n \u201cIt was so offensive that I stopped going to Executive Session meetings because I felt like the entire thing was a violation of the Texas Open Meetings Act law,\u201d Brockhouse said.<\/p>\n If Brockhouse\u2019s\u00a0claims that City Council regularly engages in such behavior holds true, the body risks investigation, UT-San Antonio\u2019s Taylor said. <\/p>\n \u201cWhat\u2019s concerning is this supposed pattern,\u201d Taylor said. \u201cYou are not supposed to be doing this stuff in the shadows. Eventually, somebody at some point, particularly the Texas Attorney General\u2019s Office, might actually get involved.\u201d <\/p>\n Sign Up for SA Current newsletters.<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n Follow us:\u00a0Apple News<\/a>\u00a0|\u00a0Google News<\/a>\u00a0|\u00a0NewsBreak<\/a>\u00a0|\u00a0Reddit<\/a>\u00a0|\u00a0Instagram<\/a>\u00a0|\u00a0Facebook\u00a0<\/a>| Twitter<\/a>\u00a0| Or sign up for our\u00a0RSS Feed<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n Related Stories<\/p>\n \t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t \n\t\t\t\t\tHowever, San Antonio voters are still likely to get a say on project via an infrastructure bond election. \t\t\t\t<\/p>\n
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