We postulated in November that the city of Houston's Office of Inspector General might be a "glorified HR department," given its lack of authority and reliance on the city attorney's office. Inspector General Robert Doguim had little legal power and the office was often relegated to petty internal quarrels.

A little over two months after our story, Doguim

has resigned

. Our story was based on records we received as part of a public information request. And while we received some of the records we asked for, the city appealed part of our request to the state Attorney General's office, which

ruled on Dec. 19

there are more records that need to be handed over in keeping with the law.

Given the new development, these records may be of compelling interest to the public. But the city has held onto them for almost a month now, despite the AG ruling. The city is currently in violation of state law regarding open records release,

which requires a government body to release the information

or contest the AG opinion within 10 days.

We contacted the city eight days ago and received this response from Tiffany Evans, an assistant city attorney:

"The City will definitely be complying with the Attorney General’s ruling, and as such we are currently in the process of gathering the documents that are to be made available to you. We will contact you as soon as possible with a cost estimate as well as an estimated timeline for making the information available to you."