The Mignon Memo

All eyes were on the Senate today as they brought up House Bill 1, the appropriations bill for the 2012-2013 biennium. HB 1 was originally brought up Tuesday afternoon but Sen. Steve Ogden (R-Bryan) did not have the 21 voted needed to pull the bill up for debate. According to Senate rules, Wednesdays are days when the Senate’s calendar starts with House bills so there is no “blocker” in front of House Bill 1 so only 16 votes are needed to bring the bill up for debate. The Senate passed HB 1 on a party line vote of 19-12. The Senate approved an amendment, with the same vote count, that swaps out the $3 billion in rainy day fund money that had been part of the Senate version on HB 1. A final reading and vote is expected to come later today.

Last Friday, the Senate passed Senate Bill 1811 which makes an additional $4 billion in funds to be used for the 2012-13 budget. These funds come from a variety of accounting maneuvers such as pushing a $2 billion payment to school districts into the next budget and speeding up certain tax collections. The House is scheduled to debate its version of this fiscal matters bill this week.

Yesterday, the Senate engaged in some heated debate over who should run the Alamo, one of the state’s top tourist attractions. The nonprofit group The Daughters of the Republic of Texas has run the museum since 1905. Under Senate Bill 1841, an Alamo Preservation Advisory Board would be created to oversee the operation and preservation of the Alamo. The new advisory panel could include representatives from the Texas Historical Commission, the land office, the Bexar County Historical Commission, the City of San Antonio’s historical preservation office and the Daughters. The General Land Office would be given authority to negotiate a management agreement with the Daughters.

As a reminder that there is life outside the Texas Capitol, here is a sad report from the Texas AgriLife Extension Service. Texas wildfires last month resulted in at least $20.4 million in agricultural losses. Damage to the ranching industry represented the largest portion. Fires have destroyed fences and buildings, burned grazing pastures and killed more than 500 livestock according to the Service.

As of today, there are 33 days until the end of the regular legislative session. Note the use of the word regular since the possibility of a special session this summer looms as the Senate struggles to pass a budget. Rumor has it that the Senate will debate the budget tomorrow if the Chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, Sen. Steve Ogden (R-Bryan) can find the 21 votes needed to bring the bill up for discussion. On the other side of the pink dome in Austin, the House will finish the week debating redistricting and a few sunset bills while they concentrate on moving bills out of committee. There are 16 days until the last day to pass House bills for the first time on the House Calendar. Effectively, that means a House bill needs to be out of a House committee by the end of this week in order to allow the paperwork to be processed in time to make it onto a calendar. Now is the time to begin watching amendments closely as entire bills are added to other bills that are moving through the process.

The cost of your Texas driver’s license may increase. Senate Bill 9 by Sen. Tommy Williams (R-The Woodlands) and Senate Bill 1583 by Sen. Steve Ogden (R-Bryan) would add an additional $8 fee for a regular license, which currently costs $24 for six years, plus an extra $1 for online renewals. Fees also would rise for commercial driver’s licenses and for reinstating suspended licenses. The good news? The additional funds would be directed towards hiring additional staff, updated technology and new facilities in order to cut wait times at DPS offices across the state.

It is a short week here in Austin as both chambers prepare to take a short break for the holiday weekend. When members return next week, they will rocket towards the May 30th finish line.

The Senate Finance Committee met yesterday to consider various bills dealing with fiscal matters as well as potential non-tax revenue sources. Under Senate Bill 1811, various accounting maneuvers such as delaying payments and accelerating tax collections would produce close to $4.8 billion in revenue. A vote on this bill and other bills related to fiscal matters is expected later today. Tomorrow, the Committee will take up House Bill 1, the appropriations bill for 2012-2013 and House Bill 4, the supplemental appropriations bill that covers the deficit in the current budget for 2010-2011. The debate rages on regarding the use of additional funds from the Rainy Day Fund.

House Bill 150, the redistricting bill for the Texas House, will be debated on the House floor next Tuesday. To view proposed maps, follow this link to the Texas Legislative Council’s redistricting website: http://www.tlc.state.tx.us/redist/redist.htm.

Do you feel the need for speed? House Bill 1353 by Rep. Gary Elkins (R-Houston) would abolish the five miles per hour differential between day and night driving on many Texas highways. That would raise the speed limit to 75 or 80 miles per hour on many rural highways in Texas. The bill was approved by the House and now moves to the Senate.

Additional federal funds are headed to Texas. The federal budget agreement for the remainder of 2011 repeals language that withheld more than $800 million in federal education money from Texas. Last year, Texas Congressman Lloyd Doggett passed a provision that effectively withheld $830 million in federal education money from Texas until state leaders agreed not to use it to replace state money that would have been spent anyway. With that language repealed, the money is now free to be sent to Texas.

Texas Comptroller Susan Combs announced that sensitive personal identity information of 3.5 million Texans, including their names, Social Security numbers and addresses, were exposed online to the public for about a year. The records from the Teacher Retirement System of Texas, Employees Retirement System of Texas and the Texas Workforce Commission were exposed as a result of human error and not a breach of security. The Comptroller’s office will be notifying individuals by letter if their information was exposed.

Current legislators will welcome former legislators at the Capitol this week. Former Senate member day is Thursday and former House members will be honored on Speaker’s Day this Friday.

The House will consider the first redistricting bill of the session on Thursday. House Bill 600 redraws district lines for State Board of Education districts.

The race for the U.S. Senate seat soon to be vacated by Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison is heating up. Republican Ted Cruz, former Solicitor General in Texas, announced that he has raised $1 million for the race. Republican Michael Williams, former Texas Railroad Commissioner, announced that he has raised $500,000 and has $400,000 cash on hand. Democrat Tom Leppert, former Mayor of Dallas, has raised $1.1 million. Lt. Governor David Dewhurst may be switching his aspirations from Washington, D.C. to an office closer to home. Dewhurst is said to be interested in running for governor at the conclusion of Governor Perry’s current term. With Texas legend Nolan Ryan as his statewide campaign chairman, Texas Commissioner of Agriculture Todd Staples has announced the formation of a 2014 Lieutenant Governor Exploratory Committee.

The Texas House passed three major budget bills in the last week. HB 1 appropriates funds for the 2012-2013 budget. HB 4 cuts spending in the current budget to help address a $4 billion deficit and HB 275 takes $3.1 billion from the rainy day fund to close the remainder of the deficit for the current budget. Sen. Steve Ogden (R-Bryan), the Chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, has stated that he expects the Senate to debate the budget sometime during the week of April 18th. Members of the Senate have said that the state needs to address its structural deficit during the current session to avoid facing more severe financial problems in two years.

While the focus of members remains on the budget, both the House and the Senate are beginning to spend more time on the floor with full calendars. Senate and House Committees are meeting late into the night in order to hear bills and move them to the floor.

The Texas Legislature has been visited by a variety of dignitaries in the last week. Lance Armstrong came to talk about cancer research funding and musician, Lyle Lovett, came to talk about the Texas horse industry. We expect to see the Texas A&M women’s basketball team honored in the near future after the team secured its first national championship last night.

House Bill 1, the House version of next biennium’s budget, will hit the House floor on Friday. Expect a debate that lasts into the weekend. Amendments were due for pre-filing yesterday and were required to create a reduction or be revenue-neutral. Tomorrow, the full House will consider House Bill 4, the supplemental appropriations bill for the current biennium as well as House Bill 275, the vehicle for taking funds from the Rainy Day Fund to cover part of the deficit for the current biennium.

Some new numbers came out last week regarding the Texas job market. According to the Texas Workforce Commission, Texas added 22,700 non-farm jobs last month with the seasonally adjusted unemployment rate at 8.2 percent. The professional and business services sector added 14,500 jobs. The trade, transportation and utilities sector added 7,500 jobs while mining and logging sector jobs increased by 5,400. The biggest job losses were in construction (4,300 jobs lost) and financial activities sector jobs (2,200 jobs lost). Texas has added 254,200 jobs over the past year.

The House Appropriations Committee approved House Bill 1 this morning in an 18 to 7 party-line vote. The budget is a little larger than originally proposed with the use of rainy day fund money to help cover the deficit in the current year budget. The agreement between House budget-writers and the Governor to use rainy day fund money freed up $4.3 billion for the next two-year budget, enabling the legislators to put about $2 billion more into public education and social services. The remainder went to prisons. HB 1 should hit the House floor Wednesday or Thursday of next week.

Meanwhile the Senate Finance Committee has been less willing to accept the bare-bones budget proposal that was initially introduced. In an effort to find new dollars, Senate Finance created a new Fiscal Matters Subcommittee, chaired by Sen. Robert Duncan (R-Lubbock), to look at options like tax exemptions and ways to improve tax collections; scrub state assets such as the endowment funds and surplus property; maximize the use of taxes dedicated to specific purposes; and review fees, such as those for drivers licenses. Another option under consideration is to sell some $200 million in surplus state property. The subcommittee has a deadline of this Friday to submit their proposals to the full Committee.

Yesterday, the House Appropriations Committee took the first official step in addressing the Fiscal Year 2011 budget gap of $4.3 billion. The Committee voted on two pieces of legislation, HB 275 and HB 4. HB 275, which received a unanimous vote, would allow the drawing of $3.11 billion from the state’s Economic Stabilization Fund, otherwise known as the Rainy Day Fund. House Bill 4 would implement $800 million in cuts and use $300 million from increased sales tax collections over the last few months. This move was publicly supported by Governor Rick Perry, Speaker Joe Straus and Comptroller Susan Combs who issued a joint press release prior to the Committee’s vote. The Democrats on the Committee voted against HB 4.

When the dust settled after last Friday’s bill filing deadline, we were left with 5873 bills and joint resolutions. This is down from a total of 7324 last session. Expect to see a few more local bills trickle in since they are not subject to the same deadline. In addition, the Texas Senate will often vote to allow a member to file a bill after the deadline. Most legislative experts attribute the lower number of bills to a combination of a tough budget and the redistricting process.

Paper is in short supply in Austin as we head towards tomorrow’s bill filing deadline. According to statistics maintained by the Texas Legislative Council, 4303 House and Senate bills have been filed along with 155 joint resolutions. Committees in both the House and Senate have begun their regular meeting schedules. The Texas Legislature does not honor “Spring Break” so expect to see a lot of action in the next few weeks in committees and on the House and Senate floors.

The Senate appears to have held up the first gubernatorial appointment this session. Reports are that John Bradley, the chairman of the state Forensic Science Commission, does not have the votes to be confirmed by the Texas Senate. The authority to make governmental appointments is one of the powers given to the Governor of Texas by the state’s constitution. The appointments are then confirmed by the Senate during a legislative session.

This afternoon, the House Appropriations Committee is debating a bill that proposes to spend $4.3 billion from the state’s rainy day fund to close the state’s deficit for the remaining five months of the fiscal year. Governor Perry is against spending rainy day funds. The outcome of this legislation is unclear as of today.

Happy Texas Independence Day to all. This day honors the creation of the Republic of Texas after Texas declared its independence from Mexico. The Texas Declaration of Independence was signed on March 2, 1836. The Republic of Texas joined the United States in 1845.

The Texas House took up its first bill on the floor today. House Bill 15, often referred to as the sonogram bill, is one of the items declared an emergency by Governor Rick Perry which allows debate earlier than the normal deadlines.

Interested in Texas redistricting and just how many people certain districts will need to gain or lose to meet the ideal population requirements? Follow this link to the Texas Redistricting page to see maps of congressional, state senate, state house and State Board of Education Districts: http://www.tlc.state.tx.us/redist/current_census_2010.html. These maps show how much each current district deviates from the ideal district size. There are also maps with the percent population change by county as well as population reports.