Michael King, in this week's Austin Chronicle, continues "the liberation of 'deliberation'" by ignoring what the law actually says and chooses to, instead, shoot the messager - a tactic employed on occasion by a couple of his underlings at the Chronicle. (Most don't, i.e.: Jordan Smith is not receiving national journalism awards for this tactic; she's getting them - where others there aren't - for ethical practices, stellar investigations and concise writing).

King fails to dispute the critics' analysis of the Open Meetings Act (OMA) with actual legal counterpoints, except to wrongly cite that "deliberation" can also take place with the public or their staff. Ad-hoc discussions can take place amongst all of those entities, but deliberation refers to a governmental body's discussion of public items in a public meeting (except when it's being deliberated in violation of the OMA)...among those that actually vote on the items (except when it involves a "third party" offering of information at a public meeting for deliberation). Section 551.001(4)(A) of the OMA defines "deliberation" as "meeting," as in the meeting already set in which public officials publicly deliberate the publicly-posted items.

Why would the Chronicle take this dismissive, mean-spirited approach? To distract from the real issue and because they just can't stand to stand alongside the Statesman on controversial issues.

But there's another reason a "progressive" journalist would discount an accusation serious enough that the County Attorney deems it worthy of reviewing...why an outlet that purports to be in favor of transparency wants there to be secrets at City Hall.  Secrets are what keep the media humming. They stand a chance at getting first crack at a story when things are otherwise kept secret...and when they don't get first crack, when another outlet breaks it, things can get mighty ugly.  But serious journalists dig deep and find stories that no one else is aware of or are courageous enough to cover (see: "Jordan Smith" or "The Austin Bulldog").

The Statesman, meanwhile, is on point. Interesting to note in this op-ed is that the Mayor has promised to cease the illegal walking quorum meetings -- but just when they meet in twos; there's no mention of the meetings in threes. Also interesting to see that he is now instituting public worksessions as I suggested in my last article. I doubt any credit is due to me or those I pilfered the idea from, but likely due to an advisor skilled at face-saving such as one of the Mayor's new lawyers.

Perhaps Nick Barbaro, The Chronicle's publisher, will come in and write one of his astute pieces to counter King's take, just before prosecutions are handed down at City Hall; to avoid the Chronicle appearing irrelevant on the matter.  Nick's done it before. He's fixed what they missed on Formula 1 as well as on WTP4 (clearly stating the oft-ignored obvious: "...We don't have enough water to run our current plants at full capacity. And we never will."),  he countered his own paper's endorsement on Prop 2, and has long advocated for more open government at City Hall.

While the tactic of countering poor analysis with a clear-headed piece might simply provide a zero-sum outcome for the Chronicle at the end of the day, I frankly find this pattern entertaining ("info-tainment"?), despite the lack of integrity that accompanies it. I only hope the public doesn't eat up King's words as the end-all-be-all; anymore than they should mine.