Radioactive Waste Dump In Your Town? Thank Your Friendly Neighborhood Texas Republican State Representative & Piles Of Radioactive Cash

Today, three commissioners appointed by Texas Governor Rick Perry will decide whether or not to approve a license for a huge radioactive waste dump in West Texas that the state’s environmental experts have already said will likely contaminate groundwater.

Although the good folks of Andrews County, where the waste will be dumped, seem to be blind to all of this (maybe they are excited about those jobs, which probably come with a nice case of glow-in-the-dark cancer), but it is clearly an environmental disaster for Texas.

How, exactly, did Texas become the favored dumping ground for radioactive waste? It’s thanks to your friendly neighborhood Republican state representatives.

Back during the 78th Texas Legislature in 2003 (the first one where the Texas House was under GOP control), the Texas Legislature passed House Bill 1567 which allowed for the disposal of “low-level” radioactive waste from other states right here in Texas. A slew of Republicans in hotly contested races this year including Betty Brown (R-Terrell), John Davis (R-Houston), Dwayne Bohac (R-Houston), Myra Crownover (R-Denton), and Linda Harper Brown (R-Irving) voted to make Texas a glowing, leaking, radioactive waste dump. [CSHB 1567: Record Vote 316, Day 53, Texas House Journal, 78th Texas Legislature, p. 1713-17-14].

The real kicker to the whole story is that these folks not only voted for the radioactive waste dumping bill, but took buckets of money from Harold Simmons, the corporate raider who purchased Waste Control–a company that has seen a lot of benefit from HB 1567. (Oh, did we forget to mention that House Speaker Tom Craddick (R-Midland) has taken at least $50,000 from Simmons for his campaign account?)

State Rep. Betty Brown (R-Terrell) has been lining her campaign coffers with Simmons’ radioactive cash for almost a decade, having taken her first contribution from Simmons back in 2000 and her most recent back in February. Here are a few Simmons’ contributions to Brown:

$2,500: 2/17/06
$1,000: 2/8/08
$1,000: 10/17/02
$500: 9/27/00
$500: 6/27/02
$500: 8/8/01

Harper-Brown and Crownover have also taken Simmons’ cash. So has Bohac. John Davis has taken $4,000 from Simmons just since 2006.

In honor (or perhaps in protest) of today’s decision, how about throwing a few bucks Sherrie Matula’s way? Since Davis has taken the most money recently from the King of Nuclear Waste, why not support his wonderful Democratic opponent and let him know what you think of his vote.

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