Utilities regulator’s leader faces calls to exit
At least three Texas legislators are calling for the state’s top utility regulator to step down after a lackluster legislative performance about last week’s deadly outages.
Public Utility Commission chair Deann Walker came under heated questioning in both chambers of the Legislature over the state’s power grid failure, which left millions in the state without power and water for days.
Walker, an appointee of Gov. Greg Abbott who previously worked in his office, frustrated lawmakers as she deflected questions or did not have answers as to why her regulatory agency did not do more to prevent the outages, or at least communicate the problems with the state’s grid more effectively to the public during the winter storm.
It was the same sort of criticism that has been leveled for a week at the Electric Reliability Council of Texas, which manages the state’s power grid and is overseen by the utility commission. Seven board members have resigned from the nonprofit since the outages, and its top executive, Bill Magness, has been scrambling to do damage control while lawmakers search for where to direct blame.
As legislative hearings dragged on late Thursday, Rep. Jeff Leach, R-plano, said he’d seen enough from Walker and Magness to prove they could not remain in their jobs.
“The PUC Commissioners & ERCOT CEO should swiftly resign,” he tweeted. “A necessary step so we and our constituents can be confident the right leadership is in place to ensure this never happens again in Texas.”
On Friday, Sen. Judith Zaffirini, D-lare
do, filed legislation that would make the utility commissioners elected positions, according to KUT.
Walker was appointed to chair the commission in 2017, and her term is set to expire in September. She served as a senior regulatory adviser to Abbott and before that worked for Centerpoint Energy. Walker also sits on the ERCOT board.
Her publicly listed salary is $201,000, while at ERCOT, Magness earned more than $900,000 in 2019, according to the group’s tax filing that year. Throughout the hearings, lawmakers have been much less critical of Magness and of Railroad Commission Chairwoman Christi Craddick, who regulates the state’s natural gas industry.
Early on, Walker had insisted that the agency’s power to control ERCOT was limited.
Yet in the House, Rep. Rafael Anchía, a Dallas Democrat and a lawyer by trade, countered by reading aloud state laws that establish the utility commission’s authority and its supervision of ERCOT. The utility commission can even remove and replace ERCOT if it so chooses.
Walker had contradicted ERCOT chief Magness when she said: “I know that I don’t have total and complete oversight” of the government-affiliated nonprofit.
By the time Anchía was done with his questions, however, he had Walker turning her words on herself, agreeing that the agency did have “total” oversight of ERCOT.
During a particularly poignant part of the questioning, Anchía asked whether Walker believed that the public deserved an apology from the utility commission. Walker paused.
“The fact that you’re hesitating is astonishing,” Anchía said. “It’s astonishing. No further questions.”
Rep. Drew Darby, R-san Angelo, also presented Walker with a statute that contradicted statements she’d made earlier in the day, when she claimed she could not speak with fellow members of the commission in advance of the outages for fear of violating the state’s Open Meetings Act.
Darby pointed out that the utility commission has the ability by law to call a meeting with just one hour’s notice during an emergency. Walker said she wasn’t aware. Darby was incredulous.
“Don’t you think it’s your job to know that? Don’t you see that’s a failing of your responsibilities as a public utility commissioner?” he said.
The calls for Walker’s resignation were swiftly adding up by Thursday night. One came from Rep. Jared Patterson, R-frisco.
“PUC Chair (at least) must resign,” he said in a tweet. “I have zero confidence after today’s hearings; and by the line of questioning of my colleagues, I believe most if not all agree with me.”
At the end of the night, Rep. Abel Herrero, D-corpus Christi, asked Walker if the governor had asked for her resignation, but she said he had not.
During Anchía’s questioning, Rep. Armando Walle, D-houston, put it simply, tweeting: “Resign, please.”