Two key Republican lawmakers want answers on how the state's troubled $3 billion cancer-fighting agency gave $11 million to a biomedical company without required scrutiny.
State Sen. Jane Nelson and Rep. Jim Keffer on Friday said they have "deep concerns" about the taxpayer dollars awarded to Dallas-based Peloton Therapeutics. An internal audit by the Cancer Prevention and Research Institute of Texas found that the company's application never underwent a peer review.
Nelson and Keffer filed the bill in 2007 that created CPRIT. The agency is now home to the nation's largest pot of cancer research dollars next to the National Institutes of Health.
In a letter to agency leaders Friday, Nelson and Keffer demanded a written explanation as to how Peloton's proposal was approved without being reviewed.
Copyright 2012 The Associated Press.