It’s pretty simple: if taxpayers are footing an organization’s bills, they deserve to know how it’s spending their money. But the publicly-funded Tennessee School Boards Association wants to operate in secret and is suing a private citizen simply for requesting its records. Now, the Goldwater Institute is teaming up with the Beacon Center of Tennessee to urge a court to affirm that the TSBA remains fully subject to the state’s open records law.
In 2020, a court ruled that the TSBA—which gets about 90% of its funding from public sources, trains government officials, and lobbies on public policy—is the “functional equivalent of a government agency” subject to the Tennessee Public Records Act. But the TSBA wants to escape public oversight, claiming it’s made minor changes that now make it a private organization. It recently sued a private citizen who requested records the courts have already said he’s entitled to.
When the Beacon Center requested records from the TSBA, it provided them but said it didn’t need to. It’s obvious that the TSBA is trying to game the system—it wanted to continue its legal fight against the citizen while avoiding a Beacon Center lawsuit. Goldwater and Beacon aren’t having it and will fight to ensure that the TSBA and all other government proxies remain accountable to the public.
Read more here.
The ability to rent your home is a basic element of private property rights. City of Dallas leaders don’t think you should have that right—at least, they don’t think you should have the right to rent your home on a short-term basis. That’s wrong, which is why the Goldwater Institute is urging the Texas Supreme Court to reject the city’s attempt to undermine this critical constitutional right.
Although it’s become better known in recent years due to companies like Airbnb and Homeaway, the concept of home-sharing in the United States dates back hundreds of years. But Dallas leaders don’t like it and they’ve decided that they want to effectively ban home-sharing in the city. A trial judge ruled against the city, declaring that Dallas’s anti-home-sharing ordinance violates the fundamental right of property. Dallas leaders now want the Texas Supreme Court to overturn that ruling.
In a brief, the Goldwater Institute is urging the court to reject the city’s request. Cities like Dallas already have the power to combat nuisances like noise or excessive traffic. Goldwater won’t let Dallas leaders or government officials anywhere utilize hollow excuses to curb fundamental property rights.
Read more here.
Tens-of-millions of Americans already live in pharmacy deserts—communities with low incomes and limited access to pharmacies. That problem could get much worse if lawmakers approve sweeping prohibitions on pharmacy ownership in their quest to lower prescription drug prices, according to a new Goldwater Institute report.
In the report, Don’t Force Patients into the Pharmacy Desert: Pharmacy Benefit Manager Ownership Bans Endanger Patient Access, Goldwater Senior Fellow Naomi Lopez warns that bans on pharmacy ownership by companies that also have pharmacy benefit manager operations could disrupt care in communities with the fewest alternatives. While lawmakers may have legitimate reasons to crack down on companies that use their pharmacy benefit managers—operations that negotiate drug discounts, process claims, and administer benefits for employers—to unfairly steer patients to pharmacies they own, there are ways take aim at these abusive practices without making it harder for patients to obtain medications.
Before imposing any ownership restrictions, lawmakers must assess how they will affect patients by making pharmacy deserts bigger. The Goldwater Institute will continue to support health care reform that makes care easier, not harder to access.
Read more here.
In 1824, nearly 50 years after he fought alongside the American revolutionaries, the legendary French hero Marquis de Lafayette returned to the United States for an extraordinary journey through the young nation he had helped create.
Historian and author Richard Brookhiser describes his triumphal tour of early America in his new book The Hero Returns: Lafayette and the Legacy of Revolution. You can join the Goldwater Institute’s Timothy Sandefur for a special webinar discussion with the author as they discuss the life of Lafayette and the lessons he can teach us in America’s 250th year.
When: Friday, October 9, 2026
Time: Noon MST / 3 PM EDT
Where: Online webinar
RSVP for the free webinar here.
