The last of the Public Utility Commissioners in Texas resigned Tuesday night under pressure from the governor over the mishandling of the power outages during the deadly February winter storm.
Chairman Arthur D’Andrea resigned, prompting Gov. Greg Abbott to state that he accepted the resignation and planned to name a replacement “who will have the responsibility of charting a new and fresh course for the agency.
The resignation will be in effect as soon as a successor is named. D’Andrea was the latest in a string of officials who either resigned or were forced out of office from the Public Utilities Commission or the Electric Reliability Council of Texas following the massive power outages and rolling blackouts from the February storm.
State officials stated this week that at least 57 people died from the storm and many of the deaths were attributed to hypothermia.
D’Andrea was named chairman of the Commission following the resignation of DeAnn Walker, another Abbott appointee who also quit over the storm’s fallout. D’Andrea had served on the PUC since 2017.
He previously was an assistant general counsel to the governor.