Texas Rangers Investigate Disappearance Of Records From House Parliamentarian’s Office

The Texas Rangers are investigating the disappearance of as many as eight banker’s boxes worth of records from the Texas House Parliamentarian’s Office, the Austin American-Statesman’s W. Gardner Selby revealed late yesterday afternoon.

The Rangers stepped into the investigation after State Rep. Chuck Hopson (D-Jacksonville) led the House Committee on General Investigating & Ethics to turn the matter over to the agency on March 5.

Hopson’s leadership on the issue is a marked departure from that of one member of House Speaker Joe Straus’ leadership team, State Rep. Charlie Geren (R-Fort Worth), the chair of the House Committee on Administration:

“We’ll get around to it,” he said. “Tonight when I go to sleep, that’s not what’s going to be on my mind.”

That attitude is a bit odd given that the missing material is among some of the most important historical and procedural information in the custody of any House agency. According to House Parliamentarian Denise Davis, the material–which was left in her office after she abruptly resigned in May 2007, included draft rulings, research, and original opinons dating to the 1930s:

“There’s some serious stuff in there,” she said, stressing that they were in a file cabinet in her Capitol office when she abruptly departed in 2007. “Some of it can’t be replaced. It’s very critical that it be found.”

So far, no one who should know something about seven boxes worth of records performing a magical vanishing act in the most secue building in Austin seems to have a clue about what happened:

Austin’s Terry Keel, who succeeded Davis as parliamentarian, hadn’t heard of the issue. Charlotte Vick, former director of administration for Craddick, said she secured the parliamentarian’s office when Davis left but didn’t touch documents. Vick also discounted papers getting tossed by accident.

“No one would have taken the responsibility for doing that,” she said.

And the State Preservation Board, responsible for Capitol furnishings, has found no record of workers or contractors shifting papers.

So, what exactly happened to the records? One would assume that Tom Craddick’s personal secret police force was hanging around the Capitol a lot would have seen something, although no evidence suggests they did. The State Preservation Board hasn’t a clue, either.

While we’ll let the Texas Rangers do the actual and eventual finger-pointing concerning what happened and who may be responsible, we think it is worth exploring a couple of scenarios:

1.) Someone wanted the records gone because the precedents they contained weren’t conducive to authoritarian rule of the Texas House of Representatives. The records were either shredded or trashed, or perhaps removed from the Capitol to an undisclosed location.

2.) Someone who really didn’t care or know what they were doing disposed of the records or had them moved not knowing what they were.

3.) Someone thought the records would fetch some good money on E-Bay.

You can draw your own conclusions about which of those scenarios are the most likely.

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