Railroad Commission Fails To Protect Citizens

If you had any doubt as to why the current Republicans running the Texas Railroad Commission (TRC) need to be replaced, all you need to do is look at how they handled the case of Atmos Energy. Their handling of Atmos Energy shows just how corporate-friendly the TRC really is.

Several cities had asked the TRC to not allow Atmos to pass on some outrageous company expenses to their ratepayers. Atmos was trying to pass on expenses like $900 hotel rooms, $100 meals, $0.85 a mile car expenses and millions of dollars in legal fees. Company officials didn't mind living high off-the-hog, because their ratepayers (you and I) were the ones footing the bill.

It was hoped that the TRC would refuse to let Atmos pass these outrageous expenses to their customers. But we should have known better. Last week the Republican-controlled TRC gave Atmos what it wanted and approved the expenses.

TRC Chairman Michael Williams said the expenses "could raise concern" and an argument could be made for denying them. But he said it would only cost the ratepayers even more when the company took the matter to court.

Can you believe that? He's trying to claim he's saving the ratepayers money by letting the company pass on these exorbitant expenses to them. That shows just how much they're in the pockets of the corporate interests. He'll probably now claim to have cut our food expenses since we'll have less money to spend that way.

The Republicans have sold out to the corporate interests. The only way to get any fairness back in the system is to replace these Republicans with honest Democrats. We can begin to do that in the coming election.

We have an excellent candidate running for a position on the Texas Railroad Commission -- Dale Henry. Dale Henry (pictured above) will put the interests of the citizens of Texas first. I urge all Democrats to take the first step in solving this problem by voting for Dale Henry in the Democratic primary on March 4th.

What The Hell Happened In Atmos Energy Case ?

When are Texans going to get tired of being screwed by the Republicans in our state government? This time it's the Texas Railroad Commission (TRC) doing the screwing.

Not long ago, the TRC's own hearing examiners found that Atmos Energy was trying to pass on expenses such as $800-900 hotel rooms, limo rides, cases of expensive wine and high-dollar meals at resturants, to their customers by using a fee tacked on to their gas bills. The fee was supposed to be used for new construction (and only for that purpose).

But I guess if you've got Republican buddies elected to the TRC, then you can break all the rules you want to and get away with it. The hearing examiners had recommended that Atmos be forced to cut their rates by $23 million to compensate for their misuse of fees. Instead, the TRC is allowing Atmos to raise its rates by $10 million. The new higher rates will begin in April.

But the bad news for Texans doesn't stop there. In addition to letting Atmos abuse its customers, the TRC has voted to shift more of the burden onto residential and commercial customers, and give the huge industrial users a break. This means that while you and I will pay more for our gas, industrial users will be paying significantly less.

I guess this shouldn't surprise any of us. Republicans have been stealing from ordinary Texans and funneling the money to the large corporations for years. This is just Republican business as usual.

But it does bring up this question. Why are they doing this? I can only think of two possible reasons - they are either incredibly stupid or they have been paid off. I don't think they're that stupid.