Andrade gets the gavel

January 29, 2008

By Ben Wear, Austin American-Statesman

Texas Transportation Commissioner Hope Andrade, at least for now, will replace the late Ric Williamson as chairman of the Texas Transportation Commission. Gov. Rick Perry late Monday named her interim chairwoman of the board, which governs the Texas Department of Transportation.

Perry needed to act this week because the commission’s four remaining members will hold their first meeting on Thursday since Williamson’s Dec. 30 death and someone needs to preside. Andrade, like all the members of the commission, is a Perry appointee. Andrade, a San Antonio businesswoman, joined the commission in December 2003 at the same time as Commissioner Ted Houghton. The two are the most senior remaining members of the commission.

Houghton has been the more active, and more vocal, of the two, often accompanying Williamson to press events and haunting the halls of the Capitol with the chairman during last year’s temptestuous legislative session. Houghton’s tongue got him and the department in hot water last week when he acknowledged at a community meeting in Hempstead that the agency hires lobbyists in Washington. That would seem to violate state law.

Perry is mulling choices to replace Williamson. He could chose to make the new appointee the chairman of the commission, or name that person merely as a member of the commission and elevate one of the existing commissioners to chairman.