AUSTIN — With time running out, legislative negotiators on Friday forged a two-year spending plan that includes an additional $3.9 billion for education, offsetting deep cuts imposed in public school funding two years ago.

The spending package, spread over three pieces of legislation, also calls for a total 3 percent pay increase for state employees as well as commitments to $2 billion in long-range water funding and at least $1 billion in tax relief.

Members of both Houses have just over a week to ratify the 2014-15 budget before lawmakers draw the curtain on their 140-day legislative session on May 27.

Gov. Rick Perry, who has threatened to call members back to work in special session if lawmakers don’t meet his demands on water, transportation and tax relief, is reserving judgment on the budget until it passes the Legislature, said a spokesman.

“We will take a look at the bill and make a decision on it once the Legislature sends it to us in its final form,” said deputy press secretary Josh Havens.

Staff members with the Legislative Budget Board were expected to work over the weekend to calculate the budget’s bottom line, but the total was expected to be somewhere around $195 billion in state and federal funds, reflecting a modest increase over current spending.

Sen. Tommy Williams, R-The Woodlands, the Senate’s chief budget-writer, said the proposed $94 billion in spending from state general revenue falls about $700 million below a constitutional spending cap, presumably satisfying many conservatives who vowed to oppose any measure that threatened to exceed the limit.

“I think we’ve written a good budget for the people of Texas,” said Williams, chairman of the Senate Finance Committee. “It’s a conservative budget that reflects our values.”

The increase in education funding marked a victory for unified Democrats, who made restoration of the 2011 school cuts their top priority from the outset of the 2013 session.

The education cuts were part of an overall $15 billion in reductions that lawmakers imposed to confront a $27 billion shortfall just after the national recession. The 2011 Legislature made $5.4 billion in education reductions, including a total of $4 billion in state aid to public schools.

Under the this year’s proposed spending package, the Legislature would allocate a total of an additional $3.9 billion in education, including $3.4 billion to the state’s Foundation School Program and the remainder for pension increases through the Teacher Retirement System.

The total package is dependent on approval of $200 million in education funds in a supplemental budget bill awaiting action next week.

“Today the school children, parents and taxpayers of Texas have won an important first battle in the effort to restore the disastrous cuts to public education from last session,” said State Sen. Wendy Davis, D-Fort Worth who staged a filibuster on the last day of the 2011 session to protest the school cuts.

“After a great deal of work and a lot of determination, we’ve persuaded the legislative leadership to return $3.4 billion to the school children of Texas,” she said. “While I will continue to fight for full restoration of our public school budget, the funding increase is an enormous improvement from the leadership’s initial plan to add only $1.5 billion.”

Rep. Diane Patrick, R-Arlington, a former teacher and a member of the budget-writing appropriations committee, also applauded the restoration of more than $3 billion for education, which she called “our most important investment.”

Patrick added, however, that it “remains unclear if the Legislature will find the funding and consensus to invest in necessary infrastructure like water and roads in these last days of the session.”’

Rep. Chris Turner, D-Grand Prairie, the number two member of the House Democratic leadership, called the budget a “a good compromise.”

“I wish the Legislature would fully restore the money that was slashed two years ago but this is a compromise and a positive development and I believe I can support this budget,” said the Tarrant County House member. “While it’s not perfect, it’s a big improvement.”

In contrast to the 2011 session, this year’s proposed budget reflects a statewide economic rebound that gave lawmakers a robust $101 billion in tax revenue, money used to at least partially roll back the cuts from two years ago.

Williams said the budget also calls for a “very significant increase” of about 8 percent for public-funded colleges and universities and about 16 percent for health-related institutions. Community colleges will get a “richer funding formula” under the proposal, Williams said.

Cuts in taxes and fees will total “just north” of $1 billion, Williams said. Perry outlined tax relief as a major priority in his State of the State Address in February, calling for a total package of $1.8 billion.

The plan would also restore reductions in the popular Texas Grants student assistance, providing enough money to reach about 83 percent of eligible students, said budget writers.

Under the proposed salary package, the nearly 220,000 state employees will get a 1 percent pay boost in 2014, followed by a 2 percent increase in 2015.

As part of the multi-faceted budget process, members of the House Appropriations Committee approved a constitutional amendment that, if ratified by voters, would create a revolving bank to fund local projects under the state water plan.

The $2 billion to capitalize the fund would come through a drawdown from the state’s nearly $12 billion rainy day fund, proposed in a supplemental budget that will be considered next week.

The commitment to water salvages what appeared to be a doomed effort to fund the 50-year state plan to help Texas confront what planners say is a looming water shortage in the nation’s second most populous state. A water funding bill was killed by a point of order in the House and reviving the proposal was a top priority of budget negotiators.

Negotiators were effectively under a deadline to get the budget completed by Friday to give staff members enough time to prepare the documents.

“It’s a complicated process,” Williams explained. “You don’t just go down there and type it up and make a bunch of copies. There’s a lot of work and computations. … To further delay that would not have been in the best interests of getting this bill passed.”

Earlier Friday, an angry House member threatened to disrupt the final days of the session to protest the Senate’s handling of one his bills.

The threats by Rep. Harold Dutton, D-Houston, escalated tensions between the two chambers but legislative leaders engaged in cell-phone diplomacy to resolve the differences.

“Is this not the same movie we’ve seen before?” Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst rhetorically asked reporters, recalling similar outbursts in sessions past. “If you write that the clouds are darkening and it’s lightning, I don’t see at all.”

Dutton threatened a parliamentary protest against the Senate by vowing to knock Senate bills off the local and consent calendar. The 28-year lawmaker later told reporters he had carried his threat but House and Senate leaders later said they local calendar remained intact as they worked to mollify Dutton’s concerns.

Nevertheless, Dutton’s threats injected an element of uncertainty – as well as legislative theater – to the proceedings as he complained that a member of the Senate had bottled up a local bill that the was trying to pass for his Harris County district.

In a personal privilege speech on the House floor, Dutton recalled his father telling him, “You need to be scared of somebody in this House.” Then, referring to the Senate, he added: “They need to be scared of somebody in this House.”

Dutton’s colleagues responded with cheers and a standing ovation after the lawmaker accused the Senate of being disrespectful to the House, declaring that it’s “gotten to the point now where I think we ought to do something about it.”

The day opened amid signs of a budget breakthrough after Dewhurst emerged from behind-the-scenes talks late Thursday to announce that the House and Senate were near agreement on a budget.

Dewhurst, the Senate’s presiding officer, said he met with House leaders to keep budget talks on track while lawmakers focused on clearing hundreds of bills – many of them non-controversial parochial measures – in the Legislature’s traditionally frantic countdown to the adjournment.

Read more here: http://www.star-telegram.com/2013/05/17/4865811/lawmakers-on-verge-of-state-budget.html#storylink=cpy

Enhancing Child Safety

I filed a bill which would update “duty to report” laws by requiring computer technicians to report instances of child pornography that they discover in the scope and practice of their work.

According to the Texas Department of Public Safety, arrests for child pornography are at an all-time high. This is not an issue that is going away or getting better. We’ve made good progress with this measure, HB 2539, passing it out of the House recently. Senator Wendy Davis is now working it through the Senate. This bill represents an important step that our state can take to protect our most vulnerable citizens – our children.

Working for Veterans

It is very important to me to continue the work on behalf of veterans that I started during my first session.

As you’ll recall, in 2009 we passed legislation that created the Veterans Cash scratch off game, which has generated millions of dollars for the Texas Fund for Veterans Assistance.

To build on this, four pieces of legislation I authored this session that support our veterans and military families have passed in the  House and are pending in the Senate. These include three measures to help service members find employment faster when transitioning from active duty to civilian life and another bill, which I’ve worked closely on with Senator Leticia Van De Putte from San Antonio, which would give a 100 percent property tax exemption to surviving spouses of service members killed in action. All these bills are in varying stages of the process, but are well-positioned to make it into law.

Strengthening Public Education

The most important thing the Legislature needs to accomplish when it comes to public education is funding. Period.

We have to restore the $5.4 billion cut by the Legislature in 2011. You’ve heard a lot from me on this topic, both in e-mails and in the press. Most recently, I co-authored a letter to the editor on this topic with Rep. Lon Burnam, which was published in the Fort Worth Star-Telegram. I intend to keep fighting to restore funding for our classrooms right up to the very last day we are in session.

The Legislature has also addressed standardized testing. We’re in the final stages of approving HB 5, which makes significant reforms to the testing and graduation requirements placed on high school students in our public schools. I was pleased to offer several amendments to HB 5 to make improvements to special education testing, assessment review committees, and career and technology education.

Improving Public Safety on Texas Lakes

In December, the City of Grand Prairie came to me with a proposal to improve the ability of municipal law enforcement agencies to patrol Joe Pool Lake to make it safer for families.

Thanks to the efforts of Senator Royce West, just today, HB 1222 was passed in the Senate and is now on its way to the Governor’s desk. This bill allows citations issued on waterways to be heard in municipal court. With summer quickly approaching, activity at both Joe Pool Lake and Lake Arlington will increase, and this bill will provide law enforcement with another tool to improve public safety on these and other Texas lakes and rivers.

Banning Double-Dipping

The very first bill I filed, HB 413, which would end the practice of “double-dipping” by elected officials, has received a lot of attention over the last five months.

We have received overwhelming bipartisan support for this policy issue. Elected officials should not get paid twice for doing the same job, and as a state that touts itself as an example of fiscal responsibility, lawmakers should apply these same standards to themselves. Even though this bill did not advance out of committee (despite the support it has), I am on the lookout for an appropriate bill for HB 413 to be amended to. Banning double dipping remains an important issue on my legislative agenda.

Protecting Tenants’ Rights

Last week, the House passed HB 1772, which would establish an important process of notification between utility service providers, municipalities, landlords, and tenants in the event of an electric or gas utility disconnection.

HB 1772 deals specifically with nonsubmetered master metered multifamily properties. These are “all bills paid” properties which do not have individual meters assigned to each unit. Bills for utilities such as gas and electricity are generally paid directly by the landlord, using funds built into the tenants’ rent. This consumer protection measure empowers tenants by ensuring they have advanced notice if gas or electric service is about to be disconnected through no fault of their own. As many of you know, this type of situation has occurred all too often in Arlington and elsewhere: the landlord doesn’t pay the utility bill, tenants are left high and dry, and cities are faced with a potential public health crisis because they have citizens who are displaced or suffering from heat or cold exposure.

HB 1772 addresses this problem by giving both tenants and cities advanced warning so they both can plan accordingly. I appreciate the City of Arlington’s leadership in crafting this measure and look forward to working with Senator Davis to move it out of the Senate and to the Governor’s desk.

As you can see, we have made some real progress on behalf of Texas families, but there is still much the Legislature needs to do in the final days. The next time I send you an email, I hope to be able to report that the leadership has reached a comprehensive agreement to invest in water and transportation, as well as restore funding for public education. If we do not make real progress on those top issues, this legislative session will have fallen far short of the expectations of Texans.

AUSTIN − Representative Chris Turner (HD 101, Arlington/Grand Prairie) announced today that the Texas House of Representatives has given final approval to HB 1772, which would establish an important process of notification between utility service providers, municipalities, landlords, and tenants in the event of an electric or gas utility disconnection. HB 1772 deals specifically with nonsubmetered master metered multifamily properties. These are “all bills paid” properties which do not have individual meters assigned to each unit. Bills for utilities such as gas and electricity are generally paid directly by the landlord, using funds built into the tenants’ rent.

“This consumer protection measure empowers tenants by ensuring they have advanced notice if gas or electric service is about to be disconnected through no fault of their own,” said Turner. “This type of situation has occurred all too often in Arlington and elsewhere: the landlord doesn’t pay the utility bill, tenants are left high and dry, and cities are faced with a potential public health crisis because they have citizens who are displaced or suffering from heat or cold exposure,” Turner continued.

“HB 1772 addresses this problem by giving both tenants and cities advanced warning so that both can plan accordingly,” Turner said. “I appreciate the City of Arlington’s leadership in crafting this measure, along with the other stakeholders who have helped in this process.”

HB 1772 received strong support from the National Multiple Sclerosis Society, which sent out e-mails and encouraged members to contact legislators in support of the bill.

“This advanced notice of disconnection is critical,” said Mireya Zapata, Association Vice President of Activism with the National Multiple Sclerosis Society. “Without prior notice, many people, including those living with MS and other chronic illnesses, may not be able to make alternate living arrangements before utilities are disconnected.”

HB 1772 was joint-authored by Reps. Rafael Anchia of Dallas and Sylvester Turner of Houston. Now that it has passed the House unanimously, it heads to the Senate where Senator Wendy Davis of Fort Worth has filed companion legislation.

The gun laws softened by the approved batch of bills were already among the country’s most firearms-friendly, allowing college students to carry handguns in class, putting potentially armed marshals in public schools and exempting the state from any future federal bans on assault rifles, high-capacity magazines or universal background checks. The hours required to obtain a concealed handgun license would also be cut in half.

House Democrats support smart investments in water infrastructure, which is why every Democratic member of the House voted for House Bill 4, the landmark measure that establishes the funding mechanism to support the state water plan. We face many challenges in Texas, and water is one of them. However, our children should be our No. 1 priority.

That’s why House Democrats believe Texas should first restore the $5.4 billion cut from public education before spending money from the rainy-day fund for other issues. And because a drawdown from the rainy-day fund requires the support of two-thirds of the House, the minority party has more leverage than usual — and we intend to use that leverage to help our schoolchildren.

Texas is 49th in the nation in education funding, spending $3,000 less per student than the national average.

Texas schools are still feeling the impact of the budget cuts: larger class sizes, teacher layoffs, cuts to pre-kindergarten funding, fewer tutoring opportunities to help students pass state tests, cuts in teacher training for science. And the list goes on.

It’s projected that we will have nearly $11.8 billion in the rainy-day fund at the end of the next biennium.

That is more than enough to fulfill our constitutional obligation to give the children in this state the best education possible and provide the funding to kick-start many of the projects outlined in our state water plan.

There is still time to get this right, and there is no reason we can’t make smart investments in our children, as well as water infrastructure — both of which are vital to our state’s future.

— State Rep. Lon Burnam,
District 90

— State Rep. Chris Turner,
District 101

It should come as no surprise that we are juggling several different priorities as a state. Water and transportation continue to be critical. However, our children and our public schools remain, and should remain, our number one priority.

According to a study conducted by the National Education Association that was released in February 2013, Texas has dropped to 49th in per pupil instructional (classroom) spending as a result of the $5.4 billion in public education cuts, leaving the state roughly $3,000 below the national average. In March of 2013, the Texas Education Agency released school district employment figures.  Over the past year, more than 25,000 school district employees lost their jobs — 11,000 of them teachers.  That is 25,000 families that lost a breadwinner and 11,000 classrooms without an instructor.

The situation faced in our classrooms is no less dire now that it was when we started this session, or when we were on the campaign trail. State legislators made a commitment to their constituents to get this right.

To date, the House has passed proposals that only restore 55 cents on the dollar from what was cut in 2011. Specifically, the House-passed budget restores $2.5 billion for public schools over the next biennium. As you may know, I could not support this version of the budget because it did not fully fund public schools. An additional $500 million was appropriated just last week, but even still, this leaves funding $2.4 billion short. That is just not good enough — not for our kids, their parents or our teachers.

Water is indeed critical and transportation absolutely needs to be addressed. But so do our kids and their future. I have not and will not waver in my belief that our top priority must be to restore funding for public education. There is no reason at all why we can’t make smart investments in our children, who are vital to our state’s future. With four weeks left, there is still time to get this right.

When state Rep. Chris Turner started looking for other states that allow their politicians to retire without leaving their jobs, he could only find one: Texas.

At a public hearing Monday evening on his bill to end the practice, the Grand Prairie Democrat said the lucrative benefit — which got widespread attention when Gov. Rick Perry revealed that he was both collecting his salary and a pension from the state — flies in the face of the oft-repeated brag that Texas stands out as a beacon of budgetary restraint.

“At this Capitol we frequently tout Texas as a national example for fiscal responsibility,” said Turner, who has filed House Bill 413, which would ban “double dipping.” “This legislation helps us make that case more credibly, I think, by barring elected officials from being paid twice by our state taxpayers for one job.”

The bill was left pending in the House Pensions Committee.

Perry spokeswoman Lucy Nashed said that if both the House and Senate pass the bill and send it to the governor, it would get full consideration.

“The governor will review any bill that makes it through the process and into his desk,” Nashed said.

Perry began drawing a $92,000-a-year pension in early 2011 by taking advantage of an obscure law that allows long-serving members of the state “elected class” — and that includes the longest-serving governor in Texas history — to start drawing a pension without leaving office.

News of the double-dipping came toward the end of Perry’s failed run for president, when he handed in federal disclosure forms that require candidates to reveal any pension income they have. Such disclosures aren’t required under state law.

Turner said he was inspired to file HB 413 after learning of Perry’s early pension draw, but his bill would not cut off the governor’s pension. It would only apply to future state officeholders. Nor would it apply to nonelected retirees, including teachers or state employees, who are elected to state office, he said.

In compiling research for the legislation, Turner asked the National Conference of State Legislatures to identify states that allow the type of double-dipping Perry is doing. The group told him Texas was the only state the NCSL could find.

The organization said that more than a dozen states specifically prohibit their elected officials from receiving a pension annuity unless they actually leave office and retire, Turner told the House Pensions Committee on Monday.

Days after the House voted to strip a 22-year-old reference to climate change from Texas law, a House committee heard testimony on Earth Day about the adverse effects that climate change could bring to the state.

The witnesses, who included scientists, academics and the mayor of San Angelo, largely agreed on the causes and magnitude of climate change, and they advised members of the House International Trade and Intergovernmental Affairs Committee on Monday to speed consideration of how to deal with the results of a warming climate.

One of the first to address the panel was Dr. John Nielsen-Gammon, the Texas state climatologist and a professor at Texas A&M University.

Nielsen-Gammon, who has become one of the most prominent public figures in the state on climate issues, emphasized the settled nature of the science around climate change, and he said there were practical steps the state needed to take to limit potential damage.

“Texans need to adopt a risk-management approach to climate change,” he said, pushing for improved infrastructure and environmental planning to reduce the net effect of environmental shifts. “We can no longer count on the climate staying the way it was.”

He also discussed the current drought, which he said might become the second-worst in the state’s history if it extended into the summer. After an extended drought in the 1950s, he said, Texas took the steps to ensure its water supply was growing faster than population for several decades – but since the 1980s, much of that work has come undone.

“The best thing to do for the drought is to make sure that Texas has a stable water and energy supply,” he said. “And doing so requires at least a consideration of the effects climate change might bring.”

Other witnesses also emphasized the principle of damage and risk mitigation. Dr. Katharine Hayhoe, a director of the Climate Science Center at Texas Tech University, asked legislators to think about the ways society depended on current climate conditions.

“We have built a civilization on the assumption of a stable climate,” she said. “If we were still living in tents, climate change wouldn’t be as big of a problem. But we can’t move Houston 100 feet uphill.”

Some tried to quantify the effects that climate change might have on the state. Dr. Bruce McCarl, a professor of agricultural economics at Texas A&M University, told the committee that some projections estimate Texas might lose up to 30 percent of its arable land, and that the size of the state’s livestock herds might thin by 10 percent. The Edwards Aquifer, he said, a critical source of water for Central Texas, could lose up to 25 percent of its recharge ability.

Others talked about the destabilizing effects climate change could have on international trade. Sherri Goodman, a former deputy undersecretary for defense in the Clinton administration, said that there was a “growing awareness of the impact of climate change on our military operations and on national security.”

Climate change is also affecting Texas’ southern neighbor significantly, Nielsen-Gammon said, adding that Texans should be mindful.

“Mexico will be increasingly dry. That will put increasing stress on our international water agreements,” he said. “Secondly, a decrease in agricultural ability in Mexico could lead to an increase in immigration into Texas. Meanwhile, Texas will have to step up its ability to deal with tropical diseases coming across the border.”

Jim Marston of the Environmental Defense Fund urged legislators to listen to scientists and deal openly with the problems posed by climate change.

“Denying what’s going on is really not good policy. We ought to have a debate about some of the things that might happen,” he said.

The hearing came just days after the House voted to strike a provision referring to climate change from Texas Law. House Bill 788, authored by state Rep. Wayne Smith, R-Baytown, attempts to reclaim regulatory powers for the state from the EPA. Currently, the EPA issues permits to industrial facilities that emit large amounts of greenhouse gases.

HB 788 aims to let the state regulate the emission of greenhouse gases. But in the process it strikes five words from the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality’s mandate, which date from 1991. The provision allows the TCEQ to regulate greenhouse gas emissions for the purpose of controlling “climatic changes, including global warming.”

The bill passed 119-23, and now goes to the Senate for consideration. A last-minute effort by state Rep. Chris Turner, D-Grand Prairie, to restore the climate change language fared a little better, but was also defeated 91-50. Turner called the language deletion a needless regression.

“I don’t believe it makes any sense for this Legislature to turn back the clock 22 years and remove references to this topic in Texas law,” he said. “And I think we need we tie our hands if we do not give TCEQ the option of dealing with this issue if circumstances necessitate.”

After Monday’s House panel hearing, committee member Rep. Mark Strama, D-Austin, said the politicization of the debate on climate change made future action by the Legislature unlikely.

“You can only send a message if somebody’s listening.” And those listening, he said, are “not the people who need to.”

“There’s a lot of evidence that the 1999 passage of the renewable portfolio standard was not only good for the environment but great for the economy. But in the last eight years its been really tough to replicate that success,” he said. “The disposition of the Texas Legislature seems to be to pin its hopes on the past, and not the future.”

It is located on the southwest corner of E. Pioneer Parkway and Browning Drive in the Chase Bank building. Office hours are Monday through Friday, 8 a.m. until 5 p.m.

It is a top priority of our office to provide prompt and thorough assistance to constituents when they have problems or issues with state government. Although our office can’t guarantee the outcome in any constituent matter, we will work hard to cut through red tape, get answers and reach a favorable resolution, if possible.

Visit our constituent services page for a full list of state government matters that our office can try to assist you with.

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Arlington, TX 76010

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AUSTIN − State Representative Chris Turner (HD 101 – Grand Prairie) announced today that the Texas House of Representatives has passed HB 1222, a bill which allows citations issued on Texas waterways by municipal law enforcement officers to be heard in municipal court. Currently, these citations can only be brought before justice and county courts. State Senator Royce West has filed an identical bill in the Senate (SB 501).

“This bill was an issue brought to me by the City of Grand Prairie before the legislative session even started,” said Turner. “HB 1222 is a product of local and state governments working together on legislation that benefits everyone in this state. With warm weather quickly approaching, giving our law enforcement officers every possible resource to keep Texans safe on our lakes and rivers is critical.”

HB 1222 amends the Texas Water Safety Act by adding municipal courts as a venue where water safety violation cases can be heard. Despite the fact that violations and offenses committed under the Texas Water Safety Act can only be heard before a justice or county court, enforcement responsibility is still shared by Texas Parks and Wildlife Game Wardens and other state, county or municipal peace officers who are certified as a marine safety enforcement officer.

By adding municipal courts to the list of allowable venues, HB 1222 would create a system for policing waterways that more closely resembles traffic enforcement on roads and highways. This issue is important to Grand Prairie because the city’s police force serves as the primary law enforcement agency for Joe Pool Lake in areas within the city limits.

Currently, municipal police officers who patrol Joe Pool Lake must rely upon a separate paper ticket writing system in order to refer the violation to justice or county court. HB 1222 would make this process more efficient and ultimately, enhance public safety.