May 29, 2019      7:52 PM

After plumbing board debacle, Texas House leadership stresses local governments to be responsible for industry oversight

There’s also increased grumbling about whether some unregistered lobbying was happening in a significant way on the issue right around the time of the bill’s failure

After a legislative knife fight at the end of the session ended in a death sentence for the state agency that oversees plumbers, Texas House leaders on Wednesday evening sought to stress that local governments will soon be responsible regulating the industry. Of course, mid-sized and larger cities provide inspections, but one construction industry insider proclaimed, “small towns will be the wild west for plumbing!”

"The State of Texas joins six other states in deregulating the plumbing industry at the state level, leaving cities and municipalities with full authority to regulate plumbing codes at the local level," said Speaker Dennis Bonnen in a written statement issued this evening, apparently in reaction to news stories centered on the state throwing in the towel on regulating plumbing.

Meantime, it’s our understanding at Quorum Report that various high-level meetings have been happening within state government to try to sort out the mess created after the Sunset bill for the Texas State Board of Plumbing Examiners failed in the final days of the session.

By Scott Braddock

Copyright May 29, 2019, Harvey Kronberg, www.quorumreport.com, All rights are reserved