The Sierra Club is proud to announce its 2021 Texas Legislative Scorecard. Its objective is to give Texans a clear picture of the conservation and environmental justice values of elected officials working on their behalf in the Texas Legislature.
Why This Matters
There were several priority areas that the 87th Texas Legislature needed to address:
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Pandemic and public health
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Fixing the electric grid
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Winter Storm Uri recovery
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Pollution reduction
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and so much more…
Frankly, it was an embarrassing year for lawmakers who care about improving the lives of all Texans, and Texans need to know if their state leaders let them down or fought for them. Overall, the legislature failed to address these needs adequately. It pivoted to attacks on voting rights, LGBTQ Texans, Black Texans, teaching our history of systemic racism, and reproductive health, to name a few.
Example 1: Winter Storm Uri
Sierra Club and our allies fought hard to bring relief to Texans struggling to recover from Winter Storm Uri via the POWER Act (HB 3460), yet this bill did not even get out of committee.
Example 2: Weatherizing Homes
We fought hard to pass a bill that would increase our state’s energy efficiency goal (SB 243 and HB 4556), which would have invested millions of dollars into weatherizing homes and small businesses to reduce the risk of future blackouts, lower bills, and create more local green jobs, yet these bills did not get out of committee.
Example 3: Methane Pollution
We fought hard to address methane pollution through larger fines for permit violations, and fought for a statewide no-flaring goal (and a suite of other solutions) yet we couldn’t even get a bill to study methane pollution passed even by a committee in either chamber.
Do you see a pattern?
How to Read This Scorecard
Each legislator has an “initial score” and an “adjusted score” (jump to scoring tables). What this means is we chose 14 votes in the House and Senate to create an initial score for each State Representative and State Senator. We weighted each vote based on how high the stakes were and how difficult it was to get the right votes.
But floor votes don’t tell the whole story. To get a clear picture of each legislator’s values, we decided to add and subtract points for work that lawmakers did (or did not do) on the backend to fight for the success or failure of certain bills. From pushing a committee chair to vote on a good bill to killing a bad bill on a point of order, it is clear that scoring our legislators actions beyond the usual “votes on the floor” can help Texans better understand their legislators’ values and priorities. We call these points “adjustments.”
For more information on the types of bills we chose, the Introduction and Key House Votes and Key Senate Votes will explain why we made certain choices and what the bills were about.
How to Use This Scorecard
Anti-environment lawmakers are counting on you forgetting about 2021. Pro-environment lawmakers need to know their constituents appreciate their hard work and courage to confront powerful special interests.
Here are five things you can do:
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Share your elected officials’ scores with your neighbors and on social media (use hashtag #txlege). Tag us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram too!
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Write a letter to the editor of your local newspaper. Elected officials pay close attention to public sentiment, and showing your community you haven’t forgotten about the job they did (or didn’t do) last year helps keep the issues you care about in the public narrative.
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Consider coming to a local Sierra Club meeting (scroll down to the events calendar). The Lone Star Chapter and Sierra Club regional groups meet throughout the year and welcome more Texans who want to fight for environmental justice.
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Join our new network of volunteers working to hold our state elected leaders accountable.
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Donate to the Lone Star Chapter so we can continue to organize and educate communities, and advocate for better policies at the state and local level.
Making progress at the state level boils down to legislators who have courage to do what is right for their constituents. We need a majority of public servants who will fight for people, and address the racial, social, economic, environmental, and geographic inequities of our state. Until there is a majority of legislators that are willing to stand up to special interests in Texas, it will remain a challenge to get meaningful high stakes votes on good bills.
When special interests like the Texas Oil and Gas Association or Oncor push back against good environmental justice priorities, your legislator’s values become clearly visible. When faced with the influence of corporate pressure, did your legislator fight for you? Did they throw up their hands and focus on other bills? Was it all just posturing? That’s what we wanted to find out by doing this scorecard.