Environment

Mayors Take Action as Texas Slacks on Climate

By John Burnett

Published November 26, 2007 at 1:00 PM PST

This story was published more than 17 years ago.

Texas is the country's largest emitter of global warming gases. But the state's political leaders say climate change isn't a problem and have blocked even minor efforts to address the issue. That has prompted the mayors of some of the state's biggest cities — including influential Republicans — to take the issue into their own hands.

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John Burnett

John Burnett is a national correspondent based in Austin, Texas, who has been assigned a new beat for 2022—Polarized America—to explore all facets of our politically and culturally divided nation. Prior to this assignment, Burnett covered immigration, Southwest border affairs, Texas news and other national assignments. In 2018, 2019 and again in 2020, he won national Edward R. Murrow Awards from the Radio-Television News Directors Association for continuing coverage of the immigration beat. In 2020, Burnett along with other NPR journalists, were finalists for a duPont-Columbia Award for their coverage of the Trump Administration's Remain in Mexico program. In December 2018, Burnett was invited to participate in a workshop on Refugees, Immigration and Border Security in Western Europe, sponsored by the RIAS Berlin Commission.