A federal court signed off on a settlement Wednesday between Disability Rights Texas and Austin ISD over its backlog of special education evaluations. The settlement requires the district to establish a fund to help cover the cost of services for students who were affected by the delayed evaluations. Disability Rights Texas supervising attorney Kym Davis Rogers said […]
Courts
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State court rules Austin must release files on police complaints. Here’s what that means.
Austin police must release records of officer complaints previously kept in house to the police oversight office, a state district judge has ruled. The personnel files – known colloquially as “g-files” – were a cornerstone of the Austin Police Oversight Act, which passed last year. Under the act, records of any complaint – even if no […]
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Judge’s order halts Nov. 5 charter election
Travis County District Judge Maya Guerra Gamble on Thursday ordered the city of Austin to eliminate 13 proposed charter amendments from the Nov. 5 ballot because City Council violated the Texas Open Meetings Act in setting a hearing on the proposed charter items. Other items on the ballot, such as Council races, are not impacted […]
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Class action lawsuit targets Austin taxes over Project Connect
A new class-action lawsuit is seeking to block the city from collecting any property taxes, potentially starving Austin’s municipal government of almost all revenue, until it kills a tax approved by voters in 2020 to fund the largest public transit expansion in Central Texas history. The lawsuit is being brought by some of the same taxpayers […]
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Save Our Springs Alliance files another lawsuit against City Council over Open Meetings Act
Claiming that City Council has again violated the Texas Open Meetings Act, the Save Our Springs Alliance on Monday filed a lawsuit seeking to block the city’s placement of 13 proposed charter amendments on the November ballot. It is the second lawsuit this year the SOS Alliance has filed against Council alleging violation of the […]
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Commissioners advance program to provide legal counsel at bail hearings
The Travis County Commissioners Court voted Tuesday to move forward on implementing a program to provide legal representation to arrested individuals during magistration, when a judge determines probable cause for arrest and sets bail. Commissioners will first need to authorize funding for the program, called “counsel at first appearance,” or CAFA, which a panel of […]
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New ruling clears the way for public comment at City Council work sessions
Thursday morning, Mayor Kirk Watson kicked off a planned budget work session in an unusual way. “Late yesterday, we received a copy of a court order related to one of the lawsuits and, as a result of that, we are going to allow for public comment this morning,” he said. The announcement came hours after […]
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Judge rejects appeal in Central Health lawsuit
Judge Amy Clark Meachum has rejected a request by plaintiffs suing Central Health to take an immediate appeal to the 3rd Court of Appeals over the agency’s transfer of $35 million per year to the University of Texas Dell Medical School. The plaintiffs – Rebecca Birch, Richard Franklin III and Esther Govea – say voters […]
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Attorney general files appeal before rail trial begins
The Texas attorney general’s office filed an appeal to the 3rd Court of Appeals on Monday morning after Judge Eric Shepperd told a packed Travis County courtroom that he would not rule on a challenge to the jurisdiction before hearing evidence in the case brought by the city of Austin and the Austin Transit Partnership. […]
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Travis County judge dismisses Paxton’s lawsuit over Austin ordinance decriminalizing pot
A Travis County judge has dismissed a lawsuit filed against Austin over its 2022 voter-approved ordinance decriminalizing marijuana possession. Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton filed the suit in January, alleging Austin was violating state law and promoting “the use of illicit drugs that harm our communities.” He filed similar suits against San Marcos, Killeen, Denton […]
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TxDOT argues in court that I-35 never caused racial discrimination – contradicting TxDOT
The Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT) is arguing in federal court that Interstate 35 didn’t unfairly disadvantage Black or Latino Austinites, contradicting the state agency’s own historical assessments of the highway that opened in 1962. “Defendant specifically denies the allegations that the construction of I-35 caused discrimination against Black or Latino communities or that I-35 […]
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SOS sues city to stop Statesman PUD
The Save Our Springs Alliance has sued the city in an attempt to stop construction of the Statesman Planned Unit Development that Council approved in December 2022. Specifically, the environmental organization seeks to stop any “permit approvals, city fee waivers, and ‘other development subsidies’ contained in the final ordinance.” The Statesman property, previously the home […]