LITTLE ROCK—Leaders of a joint energy panel agreed to delay until next week a hearing featuring critics of the governor’s Commission on Global Warming after House members initially planned on skipping the Wednesday meeting.

The Joint Energy Committee rescheduled a hearing for next week featuring a member of the Governor’s Commission on Global Warming along with other critics of the commission’s recommendations. Richard Ford, an economics professor at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock, said Tuesday that he doesn’t believe the group properly studied whether global warming is a threat.

Ford and other critics of the commission had planned on presenting a “minority report” challenging the group’s recommendations on ways to reduce global warming in the state.

Rep. Lance Reynolds and Sen. Kim Hendren told reporters Tuesday they agreed to hold the hearing next week, hours after Reynolds announced that House members wouldn’t attend the meeting originally scheduled for Wednesday. Reynolds, who said he consulted with House Speaker Robbie Wills, said he didn’t see the point of the hearing since no legislation has been filed on the global warming panel.

Hendren backtracked from comments he made earlier Tuesday accusing Wills of abusing his authority and said the spat over whether to hold the hearing was a miscommunication between both chambers.

“We should have communicated before we canceled meetings like that,” said Hendren, R-Gravette.