Regent Does Job, Suffers

We have written about the travails of University of Texas regent Wallace Hall who, because of his investigation into UT practices, became a bête noire to the political establishment in the state capitol.

As we noted, the nominally Republican speaker of the Texas state house called for an investigation of Hall, and, since then, at least one assemblyman has called for Hall’s impeachment.

“Apparently, the more questions he asked, the more feathers he ruffled,” State Representative David Simpson noted in an open letter to his colleagues. “Allegedly rushing to the defense of UT, a legislator filed a resolution calling for articles of impeachment against the regent. However, it concerns me that the legislator calling for impeachment has a son whose qualifications for admission to the UT Law School may have been one of the cases that raised the question about favoritism in admissions in the first place.” It should trouble the so-called transparency committee called by the state House leadership to deconstruct Hall but evidently doesn’t.

“The Transparency Committee, continuing to overlook Hall’s effective oversight, has struck out on their concerns, and yet they have decided to perpetuate the farce and spend our tax dollars to persecute the whistleblower,” Simpson alleges. “It is also troubling that “special” counsel has only submitted bills through November 2013 (which totaled $200,000). According to Sections 2 and 3 of the contract with Rusty Hardin & Associates, L.L.P., the Speaker must approve both Hardin’s ‘work’ and the payment of his bills. Estimates of the ‘final’ bill range from an additional $200,000 to $400,000 with the process being prolonged for months preparing the report to the Committee.”

“Finally, no explanation has been given for Hardin’s refusal (or third party directive) to produce the remaining bills, despite an express obligation in Hardin’s contract to bill on a monthly basis.”

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