The agenda seems to have settled into a more normal length, now that the major budget resolutions have passed. This time, I managed to lay hands on the RCA and backup before the weekend, so I’m posting the agenda and comments based on the backup all at once.

Readers are cautioned that I delete what I judge to be extraneous text, and often paraphrase in order to make the legalese a lot more readable; also that comments added are a mix of my own opinions, best guesses, snarking, and judgements, and therefore may not be entirely accurate. Such deletions may accidentally result in a key omission; if you wish to read the original text, please follow the link in the sidebar to the posted agenda. For a permanent link to the backup, go here.

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Update: I’m still trying to hit on a system that works and isn’t too confusing. This week, I’m going to add the RCA/backup update to the original post. This way, the train of thought for each individual item is maintained. Not every item will have comments about the backup. Where they do, it will appear below the prior comments and be marked “RCA” The complete backup will be available here for a week or two, perhaps as much as a month.

It’s a short agenda this week, due to the holiday.

Readers are cautioned that I delete what I judge to be extraneous text, and often paraphrase in order to make the legalese a lot more readable; also that comments added are a mix of my own opinions, best guesses, snarking, and judgements, and therefore may not be entirely accurate. Such deletions may accidentally result in a key omission; if you wish to read the original text, please follow the link in the sidebar to the posted agenda.
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Ok, I now have the backup for this week’s city council agenda on hand, and I’m going to run through it, hitting the high points, or where I had questions. People who want the full document may obtain it here for about one week (until Friday night at the least), after which I plan to replace it with next week’s version. Since I’m going to be hitting the high points and skipping some items entirely, you may find looking at the raw document to be better. Then again, it is 131 pages, and maybe you’d prefer my summary, eh?

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It’s a short agenda this week, what with little business compared to the budget over the last two weeks. However, the backup with RCA’s comes in at 21MB this time. Still trying to work out a way to get it off site for inspection.

Readers are cautioned that I delete what I judge to be extraneous text, and often paraphrase in order to make the legalese a lot more readable; also that comments added are a mix of my own opinions, best guesses, snarking, and judgements, and therefore may not be entirely accurate. Such deletions may accidentally result in a key omission; if you wish to read the original text, please follow the link in the sidebar to the posted agenda.
Continue reading →

Readers are cautioned that I delete what I judge to be extraneous text, and often paraphrase in order to make the legalese a lot more readable; also that comments added are a mix of my own opinions, best guesses, snarking, and judgements, and therefore may not be entirely accurate. Such deletions may accidentally result in a key omission; if you wish to read the original text, please follow the link in the sidebar to the posted agenda.

Please note that I’ve gone back and added some notes and links to last week’s agenda where I have more information. I will try to keep this practice up.

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Ok, I said someone ought to look into those “annexations for limited purposes,” and someone was me, since access to the agenda backup isn’t possible outside the city’s computer system. It seems awfully odd, if you ask me, that this information isn’t made available. It’s already there on a webserver, but for whatever reason, it’s only accessable over the city’s “choice.net” intranet.

In other words, if you’re not on a City of Houston computer, you ain’t getting it. (Hmmmmmm. Are the public computers in the Houston Public Library firewalled off? Probably….)

The problem with me getting it is pretty simple. The files are freaking huge. As in 15-20 megs; this week’s is a light heavyweight, coming in at nearly 17MB. That’s a bit large for a thumb drive, and someone might take it amiss if I start bringing a USB HD to work. Even assuming I owned one, which isn’t happening anytime soon. Then there’s the matter of disk space on my server. I haven’t exceeded my limit yet, but I’m getting close: 85 MB left. That’s actually a significant concern of mine, because I’ve kept my cyberbegging fairly low-key to date. If I start having to spring for extra space, well, I won’t go broke(r), but I’ll need to think about actually doing one of those obnoxious funding drive graphics. (As part of my work ‘under the hood’ this weekend, I’m going to see if I can reduce my space used.)

Dr. Heinous has some spiffy setup that allows him to run his own server at home despite the fact that his IP changes randomly; I don’t pretend to understand it and I just can’t see taking the time to learn Linux, Apache, PHP, SQL, and everything else I’d have to admin in order to host the site myself. J. Greely and Pixy can obsess over scripts and servers, I don’t have time to do so, which means I’m stuck paying for it.

In other words, there’s a significant problem with my being able to continue doing this. The file I bring to you today is a 15-page extract from the .pdf file, and at that, I’m sure I’m shorting everyone some interesting things they’d like to see. Unfortunately, it’s the best I can do, with the resources and restrictions I have. So without further ado, here’s the key portion of the RCA (Request for Council Action) from page 5 of the extract.

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One of my cornerstone beliefs is that a republic cannot work if the people do not exercise oversight of their elected representatives. And oversight cannot be excercised without information. Maybe I’m old-fashioned, but “Use the Force, Luke” is no way to decide who to vote for each election; I prefer the comfort of a good blaster set of facts.

It is an unfortunate truth that most people simply can’t be bothered to go do the digging necessary to obtain the facts to make informed decisions. Largely, I blame our so-called press for this; they are more interested in bringing us entertainment than information. Why should we have to dig? Isn’t it their job to bring us the facts and do a dispasionate analysis? That’s what they tell us while they whip up bogus TANG memos and the umpteenth report on Brittany Spears. (Of course, theres an argument to be made that they’re only delivering what we want, but I’ll pass on that one for now.)

Fortunately, we now have the blogsphere to make up for their lack. And I have been doing my part, giving the public such information as I have been able to provide without making it terribly obvious who I am and what office I work in. However, it occurs to me that I can do something more: actively summarize the most public aspect of the city government’s business.

Starting with this week, Houblog will carry a brief summary of the upcoming week’s City Council Agenda, taken directly from the City Secretary’s website. Whenever possible, links will be provided to other websites discussing controversial items. The summary will include a link back to the agenda istelf, as the emphasis will be on explaining (or guessing) what the item is about. I don’t claim to have inside info on many of the items and sometimes my knowledge may be a bit inaccurate, or no more than the average layman’s. Where I’m engaging in low-probability guesswork, that will be indicated. I do have access to further backup (the RCAs, or Request for Council Action), but it’s on the city’s intranet–meaning I can only grab them while at work. Due to their large size (.pdf format) and need to chop extraneous pages out, I can’t possibly provide them on a routine basis — the one I did a couple of weeks ago ran 3+ megs, and I’ll quickly run out of storage room.

There are times I think I need to make this blog a co-op effort… Anyway, the idea is that I’m doing the initial legwork to get the agenda into a more accessable format and provide a starting point for citizens who may not even know what questions to ask yet. And of course, I’m going to toss in my own observations about the city’s actions.

Assuming I’m able to keep up the pace (this isn’t easy!) you can expect to see a new installment every Monday morning. The agendas are posted online late Friday afternoon, which gives me the weekend to try and fit them in. For ease of locating these articles, I am establishing a new category: City Agendas. I hope that people will find this to be of some use in keeping up with what their city government is up to. Even if you can’t show up at a council meeting, one of the reasons council members have staffs is to listen to you, the citizen, and relay your concerns to them.

And now, without further ado, the Houston City Council Agenda for 6/13-14/06
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