\u201cHere at the city, when those services are labeled as social services contracts, the path that it goes down exempts those contracts from our anti-lobbying ordinance and it also exempts those contracts from competitive bidding,\u201d said Carrie Rogers<\/a>.<\/p>\n Competitive bidding, a process whereby<\/a> governmental entities solicit bids from multiple vendors, is considered a standard good-government practice.<\/p>\n Monday\u2019s hearing followed the release of an internal audit<\/a> that revealed Austin has overpaid a series of nonprofit vendors for services that were never received.<\/p>\n The city auditor\u2019s examination \u201creviewed a sample of 25 contracts with a contract amount of about $30 million,\u201d and \u201cfor 19 (76%) of the contracts, the nonprofit organizations did not meet one or more performance expectations.\u201d<\/p>\n The audit further reviewed 151 performance expectations. It \u201cfound that the nonprofit organizations did not meet 67 (44%) of the expected output and outcome performance expectations. This included 45% of the output and 42% of the outcome performance expectations.\u201d<\/p>\n While the audit does not outline a total amount for the overpayments, the Austin-American Statesman reports<\/a> that the sum is at least in the \u201cmillions.\u201d<\/p>\n For perspective, a 44 percent shortfall from \u201c$30 million\u201d would total $13.2 million.<\/p>\n Provision of social services through so-called \u201cnonprofit\u201d organizations has been criticized as a form of political patronage<\/a> for left-wing organizations.<\/p>\n The audit findings come at a time of unprecedented public fury at municipal spending.<\/p>\n Earlier this month, the city manager released<\/a> the latest in a string of record-setting budgets that included a record setting tax increase.<\/p>\n Last month, the city clerk officially certified<\/a> a ballot measure that could impose new fiscal transparency requirements.<\/p>\n If passed, the referendum would amend the city charter to require independent audits of municipal finances every five years.<\/p>\n Additionally, if the city council wants to pursue a future tax rate election, the proposed charter amendment would require the municipal government to complete such an audit before calling the election.<\/p>\n The City of Austin currently conducts various internal audits. The proposed charter amendment would supplement this process with regular external reviews.<\/p>\n The referendum follows the landslide defeat<\/a> of Proposition Q, a ballot measure that could have enshrined hundreds of millions of dollars in municipal spending, in November 2025.<\/p>\n Austin\u2019s municipal spending has long been<\/a> a subject of criticism. This criticism has grown following an explosion of spending for vagrancy services<\/a> in recent years.<\/p>\n Save Austin Now, a non-partisan watchdog, previously spearheaded a 2021 effort to restore a ban on camping in public places by vagrants. The council had repealed this prohibition in 2019, creating a rash of consequences including fire hazards, health concerns<\/a>, and public safety<\/a> issues.<\/p>\n A recent Texas Scorecard investigation also uncovered millions of dollars<\/a> in public subsidies for groups that promote dangerous sexual activity.<\/p>\n A similar effort to require a municipal audit fell short<\/a> in 2018. At the time, Austin\u2019s municipal budget was $4.1 billion<\/a>.<\/p>\n The audit referendum will appear at the bottom of the ballot after federal, state, and local offices.<\/p>\n Gov. Greg Abbott<\/a> has also proposed<\/a> a series of taxpayer protections, including municipal spending caps and supermajority approval for tax increases, for consideration during next year\u2019s legislative session.<\/p>\n Legislation that would have abolished the Austin City Council received a committee hearing from state lawmakers in 2025 and is expected to return in 2027.<\/p>\n \n Adam Cahn is a journalist with Texas Scorecard. A longtime political blogger, Adam is passionate about shedding light on taxpayer-subsidized higher education institutions. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Austin\u2019s municipal government does not use competitive bidding when awarding contracts for \u201csocial services,\u201d a committee of the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":381637,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[132,134,133,124418],"class_list":["post-381636","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-austin","tag-austin","tag-austin-headlines","tag-austin-news","tag-local-governance"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/381636","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=381636"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/381636\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/381637"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=381636"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=381636"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=381636"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/Adam-Writer-Final-150x150.jpg\")
<\/p>\n