About four years ago, a former councilman invited a group of taxi drivers to lunch, where he asked for campaign contributions.

One local cab company, the River City Taxi Corp., offered a $200 check — a violation of the Texas Election Code, which restricts corporate contributions to candidates.

I recount this fact, revealed this month in a filing by the Texas Ethics Commission, not to scold the former councilman or the River City Taxi Corp. (The company claimed it was unaware of the restrictions, and the councilman never cashed the check.)

Rather, it’s a breadcrumb on the road to understanding how San Antonio could hit such a big pothole on Thursday, when the City Council passed an ordinance that will overregulate ride-share firms such as Uber and Lyft, possibly driving them from the city.

Over lunch that day in February 2011, David Medina was conducting business as usual, soliciting bundles of cash for his re-election. (Two years later, he would lose to District 5 Councilwoman Shirley Gonzales.) This year, outgoing District 2 Councilman Keith Toney did the same thing, raking in thousands of dollars in individual contributions from representatives of the taxi industry on the cusp of a runoff that he lost this week to Alan Warrick II.

Toney made certain taxi companies got their money’s worth anyway, railing against Uber in public comments and adding to a 7-2 vote in favor of the new regulations. (Toney remained on council this week because votes in the runoff had not been canvassed.)

Next month, finance reports will show who else benefited from industry cash. (Uber did not give a cent.) But big money is only part of the story.

Another major factor contributing to Thursday’s crash at council: Mayor Ivy Taylor.

Taylor insisted on a vote Thursday rather than a delay.

She robbed constituents of representation in the process. Voters had just kicked Toney out of office. Mere hours before the vote, the council had appointed District 1 Councilman Roberto Treviño, who abstained from voting.

District 8 Councilman Ron Nirenberg, who represents the district with the highest percentage of ride-share drivers in the city, lobbied to delay the vote, to no avail.

District 3 Councilwoman Rebecca Viagran, who chairs the council’s public safety committee, offered last-minute amendments on the dais, an embarrassingly slapdash affair that should have justified a delay. But she and the mayor are close allies. This summer, Viagran successfully lobbied her colleagues to appoint Taylor in the absence of Julián Castro, who left for Washington to serve as secretary of Housing and Urban Development.

Castro was “disappointed” in Thursday’s vote, a source close to the former mayor said. So were many others. One was Olmos Park Councilman Casey Fry.

“Ivy does not get it,” Fry said. “It’s about connectivity. It’s about safety. It’s about drunk driving, really.”

Many ride-share consumers won’t use taxis, Fry said.

“It’s an awful experience, calling cabs,” he said. “And everyone has tried to call a Yellow Cab and sat there and waited forever. It’s a real issue. It always takes a lot longer than expected.

“We don’t have a lot of young professionals flooding into San Antonio, and this is part of the problem,” added Fry, 35. “There’s this big disconnect with the leadership versus our generation that understands there’s new technology and new ways to do things out there. … We’re really looking like the stale San Antonio that everyone knows.”

We’re also looking “quaint” and “old-fashioned,” words that District 9 Councilman Joe Krier used to describe himself on the dais. He was explaining why Uber and Lyft rub him the wrong way, particularly their refusal to “cease and desist,” as ordered by outgoing Police Chief William McManus.

Until Thursday, however, no ordinance existed for the in-demand companies to break. As innovators, the firms should not be classified as traditional vehicle-for-hire companies.

Yet that was exactly the approach taken by McManus, who pushed for some of the more onerous regulations.

“It’s another taxi service under another name,” he told me on Friday.

So much for progress.

bchasnoff@express-news.net