Tarrant County residents have less time to speak and won’t hear presentations about potential legal issues, such as in-custody jail deaths, during the commissioners court’s public meetings.
Commissioners voted 3-2 to approve new meeting and agenda-setting rules Feb. 10 after about two dozen residents urged them not to do so, describing the changes as an “authoritarian” attempt to silence and exclude the public from government decision making.
“Respectfully, I don’t think anybody truly believes that we’re all here to do this to increase the public’s access to their government or to free up their rights to speech,” said Elizabeth Miller, policy director for the Republican Liberty Caucus of Texas, a nonprofit focused on promoting individual rights and limited government.
During Tuesday’s meeting, commissioners adopted a policy that prohibits public briefings concerning “ongoing law enforcement investigations, active criminal prosecutions or contemplated civil litigation.” They also amended the court’s rules of decorum to reduce residents’ speaking time and how long commissioners spend listening to those comments.
Residents now will get three minutes to address the court regardless of how many agenda items they have signed up to speak on. Previously, residents could speak for up to three minutes for each item they signed up to address.
The rules also give County Judge Tim O’Hare authority to further reduce speaking time to two minutes if 30-49 people sign up to speak at a meeting. The time shrinks to one minute if there are 50 or more speakers.
O’Hare, who championed the changes, said “many, many citizens and multiple staff members” have asked him to “do something” about decorum in the commissioners’ courtroom. His hope is that the courtroom becomes “a place of civility and problem-solving,” he said.
“What we’ve seen in commissioners court lately is not fair to all the people who are interested in the issues,” O’Hare said. “The more civility and order we have, the better this court can serve all Tarrant County residents and every person in this courtroom right now.”
O’Hare and Republican commissioners Matt Krause and Manny Ramirez approved the changes, while Democratic commissioners Roderick Miles and Alisa Simmons voted against.
The longer than seven-hour meeting saw commissioners repeatedly clash, marshals remove three attendees and several speakers accuse the court’s GOP majority of “fascism.”
Simmons, who is seeking the Democratic nomination in the March primary election to challenge O’Hare for the county judge seat in November, said court meetings should empower residents to get information and learn about policymaking that impacts their lives. The adopted rules go against that goal, she said.
“It is just a basic responsibility that we have to communicate, educate, be responsive to those who put us in this position,” Simmons said.
Latoya Lane, a paralegal with the Texas Civil Rights Project, urged commissioners to reject the changes, saying they “severely implicate” the First Amendment, Texas free speech provisions and the Texas Open Meetings Act, which governs what elected officials must discuss publicly.
“It’s not just about the legal risk. It’s about the appearance of a commissioners court that has continued to consolidate power at the expense of its own constituents,” Lane said, before listing off policy changes such as the county’s mid-decade redistricting effort last year that resulted in a new precinct map intended to favor GOP candidates in Simmons’ precinct.
The Rev. Dr. Michael Bell, of Greater St. Stephen First Church, said the new rules will incrementally erase public feedback. To him, that’s a violation of the U.S. Constitution.
“The First Amendment doesn't say you may speak but only briefly, occasionally and narrowly. It affirms that the people have the right to be heard,” Bell said.
Krause reminded the audience that many of them described Tarrant's redistricting as unconstitutional, noting that both state and federal courts sided with the county on lawsuits seeking to bar the map’s implementation.
“It’s going to be a little harder for me this time when you’re saying how unconstitutional it is, knowing that you were wrong previously,” Krause said. “Maybe the same kind of error in your reasoning is going to come along today.”
He and Ramirez stressed that commissioner meetings are for government business, not political grandstanding.
“The bottom line is we speak to hundreds of citizens every single week — not just on Tuesdays,” Ramirez said. “The work doesn’t start and stop, and the input doesn’t start and stop here. Every single day, we’re listening to our residents.”
The new rules come about six months after commissioners voted 3-2 to reduce their public meeting schedule from twice-monthly meetings to once a month.
During the meeting, Jacqualyne Johnson and Anthony Johnson Jr. asked their commissioner, Ramirez, who was absent at the time, for information about their son, Anthony Johnson Jr. The Marine veteran died in Tarrant County jail custody in 2024. The couple is in the midst of a federal lawsuit against the county over his death.
Including Johnson Jr., more than 70 people have died in Tarrant County’s jail since 2017.
“I was hurt and stunned because this is our only way to fight for our son,” Jacqualyne Johnson told the Fort Worth Report about the new policy. “You’re cutting our voice.”
Under the adopted agenda creation policy, commissioners may not request public briefings related to Johnson’s death until the statute of limitations has passed.
Having public briefings about her son’s death in the jail demands accountability, Jacqualyne Johnson said. It also informs residents about who they’re voting for in local elections and why, she said.
In a court filing earlier this month, the county’s attorneys argued that the county is not responsible for Johnson’s death. Last month, commissioners approved an additional $60,000 to retain attorneys for two detention officers named in the suit.
Cecilia Lenzen is a government accountability reporter for the Fort Worth Report. Contact her at cecilia.lenzen@fortworthreport.org.
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This article first appeared on Fort Worth Report and is republished here under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
