(Austin) Giovanni Capriglione began his term as State Representative filing two pieces of legislation which make necessary reforms for government transparency and taxpayer accountability.
“I’m proud to have the privilege of filing HB 524 and HB 526 as my first pieces of legislation. These bills reflect the will of the residents of District 98.” Giovanni stated.
Summaries of the legislation and commentary are below:
HB 524— Requiring the inclusion of government contracts in the personal financial disclosures of state elected officials.
“This bill requires all state elected officials to disclose in their biannual personal financial statements any contracts which they, their spouse, or their majority-owned business have with a government entity,” Giovanni explained. “Citizens don’t trust politicians and we don’t deserve their trust unless we continue to force transparency with elected officials. This is a common sense change which should have been enacted long ago. I’m happy to have bi-partisan excitement about this bill.”
HB 526— Restoring transparency to taxpayer retirement systems.
“HB 526 will ensure taxpayer retirement systems are accountable to concerned citizens, newspapers and anyone else who would like to obtain aggregate information regarding the financial stability of the retirement system,” the Representative commented. “Currently there is no recourse when individuals are denied rightful information. HB 526 will allow the Attorney General the discretion to decide whether retirement systems should provide such information to the requesting party. This bill is a win for government transparency and taxpayer accountability.”
The Texas Tribune has already written a piece covering the legislation