Legislative Updates

Each week during Texas legislative sessions, TDCAA recaps the most important news and events. Look to this page for current and past issues of TDCAA’s Legislative Updates.

For information concerning legislation filed during the 87th Regular Session, visit the state legislature’s web site or e-mail Shannon Edmonds, Director of Governmental Relations, or call him at (512) 474-2436.

Updates

TDCAA Legislative Update: Called Session 2, Update 3

August 27, 2021


Our noisy neighbors are back and making a ruckus again.

Annual Conference

TDCAA’s board of directors met by Zoom earlier this week and gave our 2021 Annual Conference the green light next month. Repeat, we are a “go” for launch! We have accepted 949 registrations as of yesterday, so we know many of you are excited for the opportunity to come together in lovely Galveston for some great CLE opportunities, and we are still taking registrations HERE if you’d like to join us. We will also honor any cancellation requests for those not able to join us due to their changing circumstances. Those of you who are registered for the conference will receive more information by email regarding our health and safety protocols as we near that time, so be on the lookout for that in a few weeks.

Sputtering back to life

The Texas House has maintained a quorum for the past week and its members have been debating and passing bills. Yesterday’s initial approval of SB 1 by Hughes/Murr—the “election integrity” bill—drew the most attention from the general public, and the House will consider it on third reading for final passage later today. Afterwards, the lower chamber is scheduled to take up SJR 3 by Huffman/Kacal (denial of bail) and SB 6 by Huffman/Smith (bail bond reform), which are the bills we have been following more closely. The House tweaked SB 6 in the committee process, and more amendments are likely to be offered on the House floor today, but it may be Monday before we have access to all of the changes made to the version that will be sent back to the Senate.

The House is also expected to give final approval on third reading today to SB 13 by Huffman/Hunter, which will implement a sliding calendar of filing and election dates for the 2022 elections that will depend on the outcome of the redistricting situation later this year. Be sure to familiarize yourself with those details if you are on the ballot in 2022.

Note that all of these Senate bills are being passed by the House in a form different than the versions passed by the Senate, so all of them will be returned to that upper chamber for it to either concur with the changes or request a conference committee to work out the differences.

Legislative Update CLEs

Thank you to everyone who was patient with us this week while we worked through a short delay in launching our first-ever online version of the 2021 Legislative Update. We appreciate your patience and hope it was worth the wait!

To date, 181 people attended our in-person 2021 Legislative Update in Rockwall and 1,603 registrants are in the process of completing, or have completed, our online update. To register for the online course, CLICK HERE; the program will be available throughout the fall, but most of the changes take effect September 1, 2021, so don’t wait too long or you’ll be left behind!

Those of you going to Galveston for the Annual Conference next month (or who are otherwise up for a quick road trip) can also attend our only other scheduled in-person version of the Legislative Update on Tuesday, September 21; it’s at the Galveston Island Convention Center, same as our Annual—registration information is available HERE. To date, 505 people have registered for that course, which will be held in the convention center’s cavernous main ballroom, so the more, the merrier!

Scattershooting

Some articles that you might find interesting:

  • “DA: ‘I don’t have 100 percent confidence that I have every document’ impacted by evidence loss” (Dallas Morning News)
  • “After quorum break’s dramatic end, fractured Texas Democrats look for best path forward” (Dallas Morning News)
  • “Speeding in Texas? New analysis reveals where police pulled over the most people” (Houston Chronicle)

Quotes of the Week

“You can try to push too hard on 149 Type-A members of the House and get an outcome that’s decidedly worse. … Sometimes it just takes time.”
            —House Speaker Dade Phelan (R-Beaumont), when asked about his approach to dealing with the quorum-busting House Democrats.

“You know, for a divided legislative session, a great thing happened. Sen. Miles carried a bill that serves our Harris County residents, especially our most vulnerable elderly and disabled individuals living at a lower socioeconomic level.”
            —Harris County DA Kim Ogg, at a press conference in Houston on SB 500 by Miles (D-Houston)/Rose (D-Dallas), which creates criminal penalties for the operation of certain unlicensed boarding homes.

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