Highlights from the Texas Legislature

AUSTIN, Texas (AP) – Republican Gov. Rick Perry traveled to Houston on Thursday to announce he plans to turn down $555 million that would expand state unemployment benefits, and reaction by Democrats at the state Capitol was swift and disapproving.

Perry, an outspoken critic of President Barack Obama’s $787 billion stimulus bill, accepted most of the roughly $17 billion slated for Texas in the plan. But the governor turned down the unemployment benefits because he said they would require the state to increase the tax burden on Texas businesses.

“During these tough times, Texas employers are working harder than ever to move products to market, make payroll and create jobs,” Perry said. “The last thing they need is government burdening them with higher taxes and expanded obligations.”

Perry’s announcement was immediately criticized by Democratic lawmakers and advocates for low-income residents.

Sen. Kirk Watson, D-Austin, said rejecting the money “demonstrates the height of denial about the challenges confronting this state and its people.” Watson said it’s now up to the Legislature, which can still try to accept the funds but risks gubernatorial veto.

A group of Democratic lawmakers sent out a press release blasting Perry’s decision and warning that the state’s unemployment rate could reach 8.2 percent in 2009, leaving families in need and forcing businesses to make up the shortfall in the unemployment fund.

“Governor Perry’s decision to reject the $555 million in unemployment aid is simply deplorable,” said Sen. Rodney Ellis, D-Houston. “Texas families are hurting and are worried about how they are going to keep their homes and pay their bills. Today, Governor Perry told them: ‘good luck with that.’ If the Governor won’t do his job, we’ll have to go around him, and I am prepared to do just that.”
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NOT SO FAST
A key House committee approved a motion Thursday encouraging the Legislature to make the necessary changes to enable the state to receive $555 million in federal stimulus dollars.

The 5-1 vote came moments after Gov. Rick Perry said he would reject the money for the state’s unemployment insurance fund because it would require the state to expand benefits indefinitely.

The House Select Committee on Federal Economic Stabilization Funding has been poring over details of how the law impacts Texas, including the spending of an expected $17 billion set aside for the state.

The Legislature can still try to accept the funds but risks gubernatorial veto.

Republican Rep. Jim Pitts, chairman of the powerful House Appropriations Committee, voted in favor the motion.

Perry’s office said he plans to send a letter to the White House, formally rejecting the funds.
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STATE SCHOOL FIGHT CLUB
Facing outrage and demands for reform, the Texas Department of Aging and Disability Services says it is beefing up security and surveillance in the wake of reports of organized, after-hours fights among disabled residents at a state-run facility.

The head of the agency, Commissioner Addie Horn, broke into tears as lawmakers grilled her about the alleged abuse at a state facility in Corpus Christi, where police say caretakers appeared to have organized a “fight club” in which mentally and developmentally disabled residents were encouraged to fight each other for the staff’s entertainment.

Horn vowed to combat future abuses “with every fiber in my body.”

Arrest warrants for six individuals in connection with the allegations were issued Thursday. All six are charged with injury to a disabled person, officials said.

Horn faced a skeptical crowd of lawmakers when she laid out plans to buy surveillance cameras, add security guards on all shifts for the first time and study additional measures such as increased lighting and uniforms for state workers.

“These were deplorable, despicable, criminal actions that should not be tolerated, that are unacceptable,” said Rep. Abel Herrero, D-Corpus Christi. Herrero put Horn on the hot seat during a legislative hearing that explored the alleged abuse. Herrero said it was “disingenuous” for her to claim she was reacting quickly to end the abuse. Herrero said he had been calling on the department since the summer of 2007 to install security cameras, an action the agency is only now undertaking.

Horn said she couldn’t do it sooner because federal authorities had not given their approval. Otherwise, the commissioner said she had done all she thought possible but felt terrible about what had happened.
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ADULT STEM CELL BILL
Stem cell advocates and religious groups seemed to find a middle ground – at least for now – in testimony Thursday on a bill supporting adult stem cell research. The legislation would create a program to coordinate and regulate adult stem cell research, and seek funding and direct grants to institutions around the state.

The bill was left pending in the Health and Human Service Committee, largely because the bill’s author, Republican Sen. Jane Nelson of Flower Mound, wants to find funding for the program. If it passes, the program is expected to cost more than $5 million a year.

The Texas Alliance for Life and Texas Catholics Conference of Bishops applauded the bill for narrowly supporting adult stem cell research. Scientists, patients and advocates thanked the author for not including language to ban other types including embryonic stem cell research.

“That bill is about an adult stem cell consortium and only that, and if there’s going to be a debate about other related issues, it’s going to have to be another bill,” said Joe Pojman, executive director of the Texas Alliance for Life.

Sen. Steve Ogden, R-Bryan, has filed legislation which would ban the use of state money for embryonic stem cell research.
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EMS SEX OFFENDERS
A law preventing registered sex offenders from becoming emergency medical services personnel took a step closer to law when it won approval in a Senate committee Thursday.

“When we call EMS, we’re in our most vulnerable states. We do not need sex offenders to be coming and tending to us when we are in our most vulnerable states,” said Jimmy Bertram, the mayor of Lockhart, in testimony Thursday. During a background check last year, officials in Lockhart found out a sex offender was serving as a firefighter and emergency medical technician.

Sen. Jane Nelson, R-Flower Mound, filed the legislation as a direct result of an Associated Press report about the Lockhart EMT that also found the state employed eight sex offenders in EMS.

The passed through the Senate Health and Human Service Committee and now goes to the whole Senate.
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HOMEOWNERS INSURANCE REFORM
Six years after the Legislature voted to make it easier for insurers to change rates for homeowners, some lawmakers are trying to tighten the system.

Legislators in a press conference Thursday outlined some of more than two dozen homeowners insurance reform bills they say will protect homeowners already struggling in a volatile economy.

“The system quite frankly is out of control. Each year homeowners pay more money for policies that cover less and less. The system is devastating the pocketbooks of households already struggling to pay their bills,” said Sen. Eddie Lucio, Jr., D-Brownsville. Lucio has filed three bills, one of which would limit insurers from varying rates more than 15 percent in one county.

Other proposals would standardize insurance forms and prohibit the use of credit scores in deciding insurance rates.

Legislation supported by several lawmakers, Texas Watch and the AARP would require the state insurance commissioner to approve all insurance rate changes before they are passed to the public. The current file-and-use system approved in 2003 allows insurers to changes rates as soon as they file a notice with the Texas Department of Insurance.

Insurance companies say the file-and-use system encourages competition, and some say the focus should be more on curbing discriminatory or excessive rate practices.

“Returning to government control of rates, discounts and products give insurers no incentive to compete in the marketplace because insurance becomes one size fits all and that is simply not a consumer-friendly environment,” said Sandra Helin, a spokeswoman for the Southwestern Insurance Information Service, in a written statement. The group represents insurers in Texas and Oklahoma.
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EMERGENCY SERVICES DISTRICTS
Rep. Valinda Bolton, an Austin Democrat, proposed legislation Thursday that would allow emergency services districts to hold local-option elections to add taxation of 5 cents per $100 property valuation, up from the current maximum of 10 cents.

Surrounded by area emergency personnel, she said additional money would help the districts provide quicker emergency responses to fires, traffic accidents and medical emergencies in growing suburban areas. She noted that wildfires like the one that destroyed hundreds of acres near Bastrop recently are examples of why more funding is needed.
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PLANNED PARENTHOOD
Supporters of Planned Parenthood, urged on by Cecile Richards, president of Planned Parenthood Federation of America, spent the day Thursday trying to persuade state lawmakers to pass comprehensive sex education for Texas students and to expand “affordable family planning.” The group rallied outside the Capitol and sang the praises of President Barack Obama’s actions so far in the White House.

“What a difference it has made to elect this man president of the United States,” Richards said.
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MEDICAID REFORM
Sen. Jane Nelson, R-Flower Mound, on Thursday put forth sweeping legislation to reform the state Medicaid system.

The bill would establish new pilot programs and lay out incentives for high-quality care at facilities such as nursing homes. The proposal also prevents Medicaid from paying out in the case of “catastrophic, preventable” mistakes and requires hospitals to report errors, acquired infections and how much they spend on uninsured patients.

“Our goal is to modernize the system and re-focus it on what matters most – the health of the patient,” Nelson said in a written statement on the filing of Senate Bill 7.

There were more than 2.8 million poor and disabled Texans enrolled in the Medicaid program in August 2008, according to state reports.

In the budget filed at the beginning of the current session, the state expected to spend an extra $1.5 billion to cover growth in Medicaid enrollment.

The possible cost of the reform bill isn’t yet known.
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DEADLINE CREEPS CLOSER
Lawmakers rushed to get their proposed legislation turned in as Friday’s deadline for bill filing approached. Legislators have until the 60th day of the 140-day session to file bills.
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QUOTE OF THE DAY
“I’d like to hunt ‘em down and kill them.” – Addie Horn, head of the Texas Department of Aging and Disability Services, on what she’d like to do with the alleged perpetrators in organized, after-hours fights among mentally disabled residents at a state-run facility in Corpus Christi.