A new report released Tuesday claims the three-member RRC is “inadequate’ because lax laws allow state regulators to receive campaign donations and have financial ties to the very industry they are supposed to regulate.
The 48-page joint report by non-profit Commission Shift and Texans for Public Justice highlights potential conflicts of interest between RRC and the state’s oil and gas industry.
In fact, the report claims the panel of three commissioners “profit from the industry that they oversee” and make decisions that are in their “private interests.”
“I think it gives the appearance of impropriety,” said Virginia Palacios, executive director of Commission Shift, a non-profit, independent from the oil and gas industry, that is advocating for reforms at the Texas Railroad Commission.