September 21, 2016 5:06 PM

In Texas Energy Report: Tom Smitty Smith's sometimes bumpy but mostly Happy Trails

How state consumer champion cleaned Texas air while cutting energy bills

Tom “Smitty” Smith’s 30-year career of watching out for Texans’ pocketbooks ultimately helped clean the air they breathe, too. And, that was no accident.

The director of the Texas arm of Public Citizen, founded by consumer advocate Ralph Nader, announced Tuesday that he’s about to hang up his spurs and hand the reins to a yet-to-be-named successor. With luck, the man whose adopted “Happy Trails” as his trademark sign-off, will make his exit form the hallways of the Texas Capitol in the early months of 2017.

Were he not retiring, he would have turned his attention to the oil-and-gas regulating Texas Railroad Commission’s upcoming Sunset Advisory Commission review, Smith said in an interview with Texas Energy Report. But his main frustration as he departs is not having been able to stop the corrosive effect of special interest money on the Texas Legislature.

“One of the things I regret most, that’s left undone, is not really getting a handle on the influence of corporate money, business money, on Texas politics,” he said. “In the 30 years I’ve been doing this, we’ve had wave after wave of business groups get organized and link their donations to legislators, to specific votes they want to have on legislation, that takes away citizen rights – whether it be tort reform or homebuilder protection acts or where we are right now, which is taking away communities’ rights to protect themselves from the oil companies,” he continued.

The full interview is in the Texas Energy Report.

By Polly Ross Hughes