Austin, April 27 - The Texas Commission on Environmental Quality has been infiltrated by special interests and rendered ineffective when it comes to standing up for Texas citizens, according to a group of Senate Democrats.

The group also called for TCEQ, charged with enforcing clean air and water laws, to undergo a “top to bottom” review to be spearheaded by Gov. Rick Perry.

“When you have systemic issues (and) when polluters are now running the agency, those issues need to be examined, analyzed and fixed,” said state Sen. Eliot Shapleigh, D-El Paso. “The issues at TCEQ are systemic and pervasive.”

Shapleigh’s comments came during a press briefing where he and state Sens. Wendy Davis, D-Fort Worth, and Rodney Ellis, D-Houston, expounded upon a litany of complaints surrounding what they said was the regulatory agency’s longtime practice of ignoring staff recommendations to favor large corporations. Shapleigh also alleged some of TCEQ’s recent meetings with private industry officials were illegal.

Shapleigh was recently involved in a lengthy and highly publicized battle with Asarco, a copper smelter in west El Paso County, which began its re-permitting process in the 1990s. Asarco subsequently decided to keep the facility closed due to what its officials claimed was the sour economic outlook. Shapleigh said TCEQ, however, acted during the process in ways that reflect a complete review of the agency is past due.

“Unanimously the ALJ, the administrative law judge, recommended that no permit be issued (because) the permit could not comply with standing TCEQ rules,” he said. “At that point it was taken to the commission (TCEQ) and on a 3-0 vote the commission voted to approve the air permit.”

A closer look at billing statements from Baker and Botts, the law firm representing Asarco during its bankruptcy proceedings, told an even more alarming tale, Shapleigh said.

“In those billing records of 97 pages was buried ten hours of ex parte meetings between the commissioner and representatives from Asarco over this very air permit,” said Shapleigh. “That ex parte meeting is illegal. What it means is the judge that’s about to rule on the air permit is meeting with one side, mainly the polluter. And over ten hours they discuss this permit on a number of occasions.”

Shapleigh’s office filed an open records request for all the documents relating to those meetings but was met with fierce opposition from TCEQ.

“In a highly unusual move the TCEQ opposed the open records request and went to court to block them on the novel theory of executive privilege that these would disrupt the executive right to operate agencies in the State of Texas.”

A judge recently ruled in Shapleigh’s favor and the documents should be made available next month, which the senator said would give the public a much-deserved look at what the agency has been doing behind closed doors.

“We want those records because those records will establish where those patterns come from,” he said. “When you see air permit after air permit denied after unanimous staff recommendations come to the commission and they get voted unanimously, we believe behind that are influences from industry that we want the people of Texas to know about.”

Davis did her best to dispel any belief that TCEQ operates differently away from the border.

“The problem is systemic, it happened earlier this month as the commissioners voted to approve a ten-year permit renewal for one of the biggest contributors to one of North Texas’ air quality, non-attainment problems without so much as a pubic hearing,” she said.

The commission, Davis added, received almost 200 requests for a public hearing on the application filed by TXI Cement. Its determination to conduct business without one, however, is typical of what Davis said is TCEQ’s new policy to abandon its mission statement and instead cater to private industry.

“Unfortunately it’s become clear that TCEQ has an ethics problem and it starts at the top,” she said. “Instead of looking out for the people that they are trying to protect, top TCEQ officials have made a habit of ignoring that responsibility and giving carte blanche to big polluters.”

The move made by Glenn Shankle, from former executive director of TCEQ to lobbying for companies like Waste Control Specialists, Davis added, is indicative of the path the agency is now steadily traveling.

“He (Shankle) personally made sure that Waste Control got a license to operate a massive radioactive waste dump in West Texas and to bury millions of cubic feet of radioactive waste,” she said, “But perhaps the most egregious part of the Shankle-Waste Control story is this: internal TCEQ memos show that the scientist in charge of reviewing the application had reported that the license should not be issued under any circumstances.”

Davis said that three TCEQ staff members quit in protest over the agency’s permitting process, adding that one said its appraisal process is a “fantasy.”

“Unfortunately that heavy lobby influence that exists in the halls of this Capitol, I think, has prevented sound decision making,” she said.

Davis has filed legislation this session she said would try to address some of the concerns, including a bill that would require testing of cement-making technology to determine emission-level reductions, and another she called a “right-to-buy” bill. That bill would give communities the option of purchasing “clean cement,” which she explained is cement produced at a lower emission level.

“Essentially what local communities said was ‘We are going to take this into our own hands because TCEQ is simply not going to do the job of regulating this industry,’” she explained.

The communities were subsequently sued by the cement industry, but Davis said her bill would reaffirm the municipalities’ rights to purchase “clean cement” in order to affect change in environmental policies by driving the markets.