The Texas Open Meetings Act dictates how government conducts meetings and defines citizen participation in public meetings.  Only items included on an agenda are permitted to be discussed during a public meeting.

A meeting that is “open to the public” under the Act is one that the public is permitted to attend. The Act does not entitle the public to choose the items to be discussed or to speak about items on the agenda.  A governmental body may, however, give members of the public an opportunity to speak at a public meeting. If it does so, it may set reasonable limits on the number, frequency and length of presentations before it, but it may not unfairly discriminate among speakers for or against a particular point of view.