Launching Pad

by Erica C. Barnett

Tony Garza

Joe Henderson

As often as it has beenmaligned and threatened with shutdown by candidates in recent years, the Texas Railroad Commission has proved to be a surprisingly resilient institution. For decades, the stalwart commission, whose putative function is the regulation of the oil and gas industry, has resisted repeated threats by rising politicians to drastically cut its budget or convert it to an appointed position or board -- a fact which is all the more surprising when one considers that few Texans know what the Railroad Commission does, and even fewer are directly affected by its regulatory decisions. With most of its powers to regulate transportation removed or delegated to the federal government, and oil prices steadily plummeting, the Texas Railroad Commission of the late 1990s is a faint and obscure shadow of the regulatory powerhouse it was in the early 20th century. As a result, the candidates who win slots on the commission are without exception those who first win the blessings of the oil and gas industry, a group rarely known to hedge its bets.

Two major-party candidates -- Republican former Secretary of State Tony Garza and Democrat Joe Henderson -- and one Libertarian, Jim Spurlock, are vying for the seat being vacated this year by unsuccessful Republican Attorney General candidate Barry Williamson. Of the two major candidates, Garza, who is expected to win by a large margin, has raised over $2 million, largely from oil and gas industry interests, while Henderson is running his campaign on less than $100,000.

Henderson, a 53-year-old attorney and insurance salesman from Huntsville, has a personality that one might describe kindly as ebullient -- or, less kindly, as downright brash. A straight-talking man with a thick East Texas accent, Henderson isn't afraid to tell it like he sees it -- and as he sees it, Tony Garza wants nothing more than to use the Railroad Commission as a stepping stone to higher office. Henderson, who has pledged to serve his full six-year term if elected, has publicly implored Garza to do the same. "I don't think the learning curve for this job will allow you to be effective in the first few years, but maybe [Garza] thinks you can," Henderson says. "I don't think I'm as quick a study as he is."

But for many former railroad commissioners, mastery of the job has been secondary to accumulating capital -- political and monetary -- to be spent in the next campaign for office, often two or three years down the line. Of the 11 railroad commissioners elected in the past two decades, five have sought another office during the six-year term, including Williamson and GOP land commissioner candidate Carole Keeton Rylander. Garza, who was the first Republican judge in Cameron County as well as Texas' first Hispanic secretary of state, shrugs off the notion that, if elected, he will be quick to abandon his post. "Of course I enjoy public life and I would like to remain in public life after this office," he says, but "I'm going to be as active and aggressive as I can as railroad commissioner, and I'll have a sense of when I need to go. Whether that's six years or 12 years or whatever, I don't know."

He may have to start thinking about it soon. Assuming he is elected on Nov. 3, Garza, who led his opponent 38% to 26% in the most recent Texas Poll, will enter an office widely regarded as a launching pad for rising political stars. Already, he is an early pick to be the first Hispanic governor of Texas, although he laughs off such speculative suggestions. Both money and the support of an overwhelmingly popular governor are on Tony Garza's side, as is his status as a symbol of what many call the future of the Republican party -- young, conservative, and Hispanic (see related story).

Henderson, meanwhile, hopes the governor's coattails aren't as long as self-proclaimed "George Bush Republicans" claim. "The voters of Texas are smarter than the Republicans think they are. They look at individual candidates and where they stand on the issues -- they like Bush better than Mauro, but they don't adopt everything Bush stands for," Henderson says. If sharing the ticket with Bush were the only criterion voters looked for in picking candidates, he suggests, "let's just let Bush pick all the candidates and save all the money from these campaigns."

The problem, Henderson says, is a campaign finance system that allows money, along with name recognition and party affiliation, to determine the difference between an endorsement-winning candidate and an underfunded also-ran. Since the winner typically slides into a commission seat heavily greased by donations from the industry he or she will be regulating, the railroad commission is widely regarded as sitting in the pocket of the industry. Henderson, who unsuccessfully sought donations from oil and gas interests, says he is "somewhat in despair" over his low ranking in the polls. "One month before the election 40% of the people don't know who they're going to vote for. Why call this an election? Why not call it a charade?" he says. "It's not a résumé contest; it's a money contest."

Garza says he recognizes the conflict inherent in taking money from the companies he will, in a few short months, have to regulate if he is elected. "Admittedly, it's difficult. Admittedly, there's no easy answer," he says. But, he insists, the problem is more perception than reality. "I think [former RRC commissioner] John Sharp put it well when he said, 'You can't be bought if you're not for sale,'" Garza says. "I know my decisions can't be influenced."

---

Abolish RRC?

In recent years, the question of influence has led candidates to suggest downsizing or eliminating the commission altogether; in 1996, all three challengers who sought to unseat incumbent Rylander ran on variations of such a platform. Although Henderson agrees that, ultimately, the public would best be served by merging the commission with the Public Utility Commission, the issue has not become prominent in this year's campaign, and the solvency of the Railroad Commission seems, for at least the next two years, assured. Garza, who left his appointed position as secretary of state to seek the railroad commission office, says that Texas has enough appointed positions already. "We all want ways to do it more effectively," he says. "I think people want smaller and more efficient government, but I don't think I'm prepared to say so small we can't fulfill our basic objectives: railroad safety and enforcement, environmental safety, and regulation of the industry."