Transparency is not like pregnancy, where either you are or you aren't pregnant, and there are no in-between states. Transparency, like democracy itself, has an endless number of in-between states. No matter where a city government is on the spectrum, there is the opportunity to achieve greater transparency. No one should ever be satisfied with the status quo. It's important to celebrate whenever government takes small steps in the right direction. The Richardson City Council did just that October 6, 2025.
The Richardson City Council reviewed the process by which boards and commissions are appointed and how much of the process is recorded, including board and commission meetings themselves. The Council considered these questions, among others:
"Continue interviews in public session?"
All six of the council members in attendance (Arefin was absent) agreed to continue the existing practice. It seemed odd to me that the question was even asked. For city councils appointing people to voluntary, advisory boards/commissions, state law is fairly clear that a quorum of the city council generally may not conduct those interviews or deliberations in a closed session under the personnel exception to open meetings, because those applicants are not "public officers or employees" in the sense required by the statute. The situation is different for appointments to quasi-judicial boards. For those, a closed session is permitted (not required) under state law, because the City Council is discussing the appointment of "public officers." In any case the City Council was in unanimous agreement to continue current practice.
"Is there interest in video recording/broadcasting board/commission interviews?"
This question had, in the words of Mayor Amir Omar, "somewhat unanimous opposition" to the mayor's support for making a video record of these open meetings: "If it's considered an open meeting, then any resident of our city could show up with a camera. They could record the meeting. We've had this happen in open meetings in the past, and it would live on for perpetuity. ... If there's a scenario where a resident can show up and record the meeting, then why wouldn't we just record the meeting and make it easier for all parties to kind of understand what it's all about?"
Council member Dan Barrios understood the logic here. Barrios gave an example from the Charter Review Commission, where he wanted to review what the commission said about a certain point and he had to go to a private video record made by an audience member because the city didn't record the meeting. He said, "That's bothersome, that I had to do that." But it wasn't enough to change even Barrios's mind. The private citizen who did his own recording is Justin Neth, whom I'd nominate for the "Award for Public Champion of Tranparency" if there were such an award. I hope he attends future special called meetings where the council deliberates board and commission picks.
Meanwhile, the council decided to keep things as they are now, meaning no official video record of public meetings where applicants for boards and commissions are interviewed and deliberated.
"Is there interest in utilizing an applicant scoring system?"
There was unanimous agreement for developing some kind of scoring rubric for board applications that includes criteria like leadership programs attended, community involvement, professional experience, and applicant quality. City Manager Don Magner was directed to compile council member feedback on the draft scoring rubric developed by council member Joe Corcoran and present a revised version in a future meeting. Board applicant interviews will be rescheduled for December meetings to allow time to implement the new application review process.
As long as the scoring system includes an assessment of the candidates' relevant expertise in the domain that the board or commission is responsible for, and gives significantly more weight to that than, say, attending Leadership Richardson, I'll consider it an improvement over current practice. I don't want to see any more City Plan Commissioners with no urban planning experience flying by the seat of their pants when deliberating zoning changes for major developments.
Is there any interest in "Recording / Broadcasting Board and Commission Meetings?"
Greg Sowell presented the current practice of broadcasting and making a video record of *most* city council and CPC meetings. As already discussed the city council explicitly chooses not to record certain special called meetings, even though the meetings are open to the public. The current cost to the city for videoing regular meetings is $26,035/year. The cost of extending this to board and commission meetings would cost an estimated $104,000 per room in one time upfront costs and $150,500/year in operating costs.
Don Magner recommended keeping the current system for council and CPC meetings, but making audio (but not video) recordings for boards and commission meetings. The cost of that would be cost effective ($3,126 for year 1) and can be implemented quickly.
The council agreed to start audio recording of board and commission meetings on January 1, 2026, with possibly expanding to video recording in the new city hall if the then council decides it wants to. All board and commission members will be informed of the change to allow them to step down if desired and give the council time to appoint replacements this December.
There's no final victory in this never-ending journey towards transparency, but all told, the council took some small but significant steps towards greater transparency. For that we should be grateful to all of them. But I'm going to go back in the archives to identify three people who deserve special recognition. These three were candidates for city council in 2025. Here is how they answered one particular question in the LWV-Richardson Candidate Forum on April 16, 2025.
Q. Do you think there is enough transparency in the way the City Council appoints members to city boards and commissions?
Lisa Marie Kupfer gave an impassioned answer. "We look and we can say we're very proud of the representation within our boards and commissions in aggregate, I sit before you as a woman on a stage full of men, except for the moderator, but when you look at our quasi judicial boards, they are overwhelmingly men...I think a step towards having more women leaders at all levels is putting more women leaders in those quasi-judicial positions. I think that comes into transparency and being able to articulate why folks are appointed, who folks were reached out to, what applications we have come in. I do think that's an area that Richardson can do better."
Amir Omar said, "I don't think we're transparent enough, and I don't think that our approach is predictable enough. Imagine you're a resident that is incredibly qualified for a particular board or commission, and imagine then that you apply and you don't even get an interview. What happened? Why did it happen? What could I have done differently? All of those questions can't be answered today because all of it is done in a way that doesn't actually share the information." He didn't leave it at that. Like the idea man he is, he was ready with ideas of how to improve the process: written job descriptions, documented rubric for ranking candidates, and open meetings.
Bob Dubey said, "The process, in my opinion, is working really pretty well."
Source: The Wheel.
The first candidate, Lisa Kupfer, lost her bid for election, but I like to think her impassioned plea for greater transparency rubbed off in some way, somehow, on the others. So she deserves honorable mention in this post.
The second candidate, Amir Omar, was elected mayor. It's plausible to hypothesize that a change in mayor had an effect, whether large or small, on how the council operates today. In any case, the new council is off to a good start with Mayor Omar at the helm. All share the credit, of course, not least the new mayor.
The third candidate, Mayor Bob Dubey, wasn't re-elected, in part perhaps because he gave off an impression of seeing no need for continuous improvement. Maybe that lesson rubbed off in some way, somehow, on the others as well. So he deserves mention as well.
Quotes have been lightly edited for clarity and brevity.
"Transparency grows
in small steps toward the sun's truth,
never all at once."
—h/t ChatGPT
1 comment:
About that headline...I'm not proud of it. It is more clickbait than anything. But I was really thinking of all the times in the past when council members would claim the city is "transparent" as if it's an either-or thing and not a place on a spectrum that can always be improved.
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