Sunset Bill for TCEQ

Companion is SB 1397 by Schwertner

See HB 845. This bill requires colleges/universities to report expenditures to non-profit media (Texas Tribune).

Allows port authorities/nav. districts to dispose of slivers of land from survey discrepancies without notice requirements. Perez friendly, don't endanger relationship. Probably not a bill to engage on due to its very limited scale, but definitely need to monitor. 

Current language retains existing 1/4-page notice provision

Need to monitor. Companion is SB 1487 by Bettencourt

Donnis: On its face, it appears to be simply a measure to give individual taxpayers a right to choose electronic communications with the tax office rather than written communication. I wonder, though, if the wording is loose enough to encourage a rogue tax official to maintain that it provides cover for using e-notices rather than public notices in a newspaper. Reid's response: I see your concern here, but I think it would be very difficult to argue that public notice falls under these provisions. The bill defines “communication” as something “required or permitted to be delivered” to a property owner. That “delivered” language appears several times throughout the bill. I suppose a rogue official could argue that a newspaper (containing public notices) gets delivered, but I think that would be a real stretch, since public notice is typically discussed in the context of publication, not delivery. And certainly not in the context of delivery to an individual, who could choose to receive that delivery electronically.

Local elections to legalize 8-liners, requires newspaper notice

Nondisclosure intoxication record

Nondisclosure of criminal history: The tsunami of drug convictions across all socioeconomic groups makes a law like this almost an eventuality. This bill is limited to nonviolent first offenders who keep their noses clean for a defined period afterward.  I don’t want TPA to support it, but I don’t want TPA to oppose it either. 

Companion to SB 499 by Zaffirini

Confidentiality of judicial work product

See companion SB 372 (passed house and senate)

Can a clerk just modify a record because someone asks? Reid: "I do think that's what it means. It would have to be someone who fits the definition in 552.114 and would have to be the kind of information that's described there. But if it fits the bill, the this bill would require the clerk to redact at their request. Might be worth having a conversation with the author.

3/15/23 We further reviewed the bill and concluded that the bill did no harm and removed it from our list.

Bill adds a newspaper notice for property owners association.

Committee sub takes that notice away. 

Access to accident reports - since bill contains the current language that includes newspapers, we should monitor.

Need more info. This sets up a public database, but “deidentifies suspects on the database. Companion is SB 875 by West

3/21 met with Natoya who suggests we set up meeting w/ Andre Treiber, chief of staff to get better understanding of bill. Need to set appointment soon.

3/23 Met with folks from the Bail Project and the Texas ACLU. They explained that this bill will be useful for investigative reporters who are doing statistical analyses of bail practices, and that the aggregated “deidentified” data doesn’t endanger public access to identities of suspects through the usual normal channels.

We do not need to take a position

Affects newspaper subscriptions that are on auto-renew. May want to oppose.

Per Reid Pillifant: HB 220 Tweaks the text of the notice that’s required, but doesn’t alter where notice appears. Worth monitoring

Per Reid Pillifant: HB 2221 just changes the percentage required to approve a tax rate (from a majority to 60 percent). Suggests we monitor. 

Good newspaper notice language introduced.

TPA registered card of support for bill on 3/2823

Adds a newspaper notice. Monitor for amendments

Go see author and see if we can add Newspaper Notice to the bill. Note that he is calling for a website notice with email notification which our statewide site can provide.

A Todd Hunter bill that ELIMINATES a newspaper notice in favor of placing a news release on a governmental agency’s website. Need to take up the issue with him - could be a drafting mistake. Companion is SB 1032 by Kolkhorst. Talk to her after Hunter.

2/28: Per Hunter’s suggestion Donnis spoke with David Eichler with TPWD and he’s fine with a committee sub on HB 2475 maintaining the existing newspaper notice requirement AND the press release they wanted to add on oyster bed closures. Eichler is going to notify Kolkhorst’s office. We will continue to monitor.