Former state Sen. Tommy Williams, speaking to GOP women in Conroe last week. (AP Photo/Conroe Courier, Jason Fochtman)
Former state Sen. Tommy Williams, as expected, has taken a job as top lobbyist for his alma mater, Texas A&M.
Regents of the Texas A&M University System on Thursday approved Williams’ appointment as vice chancellor for federal and state relations. He begins the job Dec. 2.
In this year’s legislative session, Williams was the Senate’s top budget writer. In 2011, Williams, R-The Woodlands, pushed through a reorganization and expanded funding of the driver’s license bureaucracy, so that Texans have shorter waits as they obtain or renew their licenses.
Earlier this month, Williams told his staff he was going to resign, according to the online political news outlet Texas Tribune. Late last week, he did that rather suddenly. As Joshua Fechter of the San Antonio Express-News blogged, a Williams spokesman last week was tight-lipped about whether the senator was going to land a job in Aggieland. As we’ve noted in an earlier post, it was not at all clear that Williams could stay on as head of the powerful Senate Finance Committee. His fate was linked to the outcome of the March 5 GOP primary for lieutenant governor.
Gov. Rick Perry has not set the date for a special election to fill out the remainder of Williams’ term. It expires in 2016. Reps. Brandon Creighton, R-Conroe, and Steve Toth, R-The Woodlands, have jumped in to the race to succeed Williams. Richard “Gordy” Bunch, founder and head of The Woodlands Financial Group, is considering the race. The district covers all or part of Chambers, Galveston, Harris, Jefferson, and Montgomery counties.