Battle In Farmer’s Branch Over Anti-Immigrant Ordinance Takes A New Twist

It looks like the city of Farmer’s Branch will be out some substantial cash for its idiotic attempts to ban illegal immigrants from renting property in the city. And, it also looks like the city is doing everything within its power to keep documents dealing with that situation–and the fees–out of the public eye.

From the Fort Worth Star-Telegram:

Foes of Farmers Branch’s anti-illegal-immigration efforts are demanding, through new court filings, that the city turn over more documents in a lawsuit alleging that the city violated the state’s open-meetings act.

They are also seeking $480,000 in attorneys’ fees from the city for a case that Farmers Branch lost in court this summer.

[...]

For the earlier victory, the firm requested Friday that U.S. District Judge Sam Lindsay order Farmers Branch to pay for $450,000 in legal fees and $30,000 in expenses. It is not known when Lindsay will decide.

On Friday afternoon, Michael Jung, an attorney for the city, said he had not had a chance to read the claim for the fees.

Also on Friday, Bickel and Brewer filed a motion in 116th Judicial District Court in Dallas seeking to force the city to turn over more documents as part of the discovery process.

Attorney Bill Brewer said “there’s no question” the city has more documents that need to be released. E-mails already turned over in discovery refer to other e-mails that have not been produced, he said.

Jung said Farmers Branch has already turned over all relevant material.

“A lot of it turns on their fanciful theories about conspiracies to violate the open-meetings act — conspiracies that did not occur,” he said.

In my experience, it’s usually not a “conspiracy” per se that results in violations of the Open Meetings Act and Public Information Act. It’s usually arrogance and a belief that no one will call the government’s hand in it.

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