Harris County cancelled its October 6 court meeting. The October 15 meeting it announced has no agenda.

Harris County has cancelled the only October Commissioners Court meeting on its Legistar calendar, and the October 15 meeting the county judge announced sits on the county’s agenda portal with no agenda attached and does not appear on Legistar at all.

Both pages were read on September 29. The Legistar calendar lists one future meeting, October 6 at 9 a.m., and its location line reads “1001 Preston, 1st Floor *CANCELLED*.” The county’s agenda portal does not list October 6 at all. Under the heading “Next Court Meetings” it shows Commissioners Court on October 15 at 9 a.m. with no documents linked.

Why it matters

If the cancellation holds and October 15 goes forward, Commissioners Court will go 23 days without meeting, from the September 22 business court meeting to October 15. A resident who wants to speak on a county item, or just find out what the court is about to vote on, has to choose between two official county pages that give different answers on the same day.

Nothing here is late. Texas law sets the floor at 72 hours before a meeting, so the county has until the morning of October 12 to post for October 15. It has not posted anything yet, and no outlet has reported either fact.

By the numbers

1 future meeting on the county’s Legistar calendar as of September 29, and it is the cancelled October 6 date
0 agendas posted for any October meeting, on either county system
4 meeting rows on the Legistar calendar in total: a September 8 special meeting, September 17, the September 22 business court meeting, and October 6 marked cancelled
23 days from September 22 to October 15
72 hours of posted notice required before a meeting under Texas Government Code 551.043, which drops to 1 hour for a declared emergency or urgent public necessity under 551.045
October 12, 9 a.m. is the 72 hour mark for a 9 a.m. October 15 meeting

The other side

Cancelling a meeting is ordinary county business. Courts cancel when there is nothing ready to take up, and a calendar system can lag a scheduling change by days without anyone doing anything wrong. The Open Meetings Act does not require an agenda 16 days out. It requires one 72 hours out, and the county is well inside that window.

That case holds on the law. It does not explain why two county pages give residents two different answers, or why neither page carries a notice saying why October 6 was cancelled. The county publishes both systems. Keeping them in agreement is not a legal question.

What to watch

Whether an agenda for October 15 is posted by 9 a.m. on October 12, the 72 hour mark
Whether the Legistar calendar adds October 15, or drops the cancelled October 6 row
Whether the court takes up the Flock camera contract on October 15, the meeting County Judge Lina Hidalgo said would answer questions about the program
Whether a second October meeting is posted at all

Bottom line

The county is not breaking the notice law. It is running two public calendars that disagree, in the month it has said it will answer questions about the largest license plate camera network in Texas, and neither calendar yet carries an agenda for anything. A resident who checks today cannot tell when Commissioners Court next meets. That is a notice problem whether or not it is a legal one.