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House Bill 1914 |
House Author: McReynolds et al. |
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Effective: See below |
Senate Sponsor: Nichols |
Previous law created the Private Sector Prison Industries Oversight Authority to approve, certify, and oversee the operation of private sector prison industries programs in the Texas Department of Criminal Justice (TDCJ), the Texas Youth Commission, and county correctional facilities. House Bill 1914 amends the Government Code to abolish the Private Sector Prison Industries Oversight Authority on the date on which the Texas Board of Criminal Justice is designated as the certificate holder for Texas by the federal Bureau of Justice Assistance, and to transfer all powers, duties, obligations, rights, contracts, appropriations, records, real or personal property, and personnel of the authority to the board. In addition to standard across-the-board sunset provisions regarding board membership qualifications and training requirements, the bill requires the board to ensure that private sector prison industries programs are operated in a manner that is designed to avoid the loss of existing jobs for Texas employees who are not incarcerated or imprisoned. The bill sets forth limitations on contracts entered into or renewed by a governmental entity and an employer for a program relating to a determination by the board that the contract has negatively affected or would negatively affect any Texas employer and includes provisions relating to the procedure to be used by the board in making such a determination.
House Bill 1914 requires a governmental entity, not later than the 60th day before the entity intends to enter into a contract with an employer for a private sector prison industries program, to notify certain legislative, labor, and business entities, as well as any employer that employs persons in Texas who are not incarcerated or imprisoned and who perform work in the same job descriptions as participants in the program covered by the contract or who are otherwise engaged in the manufacture of the same or a substantially similar product as will be manufactured under the contract. The bill amends the Labor Code to require the Texas Workforce Commission to adopt rules necessary to implement the notification process of a governmental entity to such Texas employers as soon as practicable after the effective date of the bill and not later than January 1, 2010. The bill revises the authorized uses of money in the private sector prison industry account, requires the comptroller of public accounts, on each certification by TDCJ that an amount has been deposited to the credit of the general revenue fund from program participants' wage deductions, to transfer an equivalent amount from the general revenue fund to the account until the balance in the account is $1 million, rather than $2 million, and prohibits the balance of the account from exceeding $1 million.
House Bill 1914 reduces from 5,000 to 750 the maximum number of participants the board is authorized to allow in the private sector prison industries program at any one time but provides a temporary exemption from that limitation under certain conditions. The bill prohibits the board from authorizing the operation of more than 11 cost accounting centers at any one time. It requires the board to adopt rules requiring a contract entered into by a governmental entity concerning a program to include job descriptions for any work that will be performed by participants and a description of any product that will be manufactured, to charge a program employer or other participating entity the fair market value for the lease of any property under the contract, and to make certain program information publicly available.
House Bill 1914 takes effect June 19, 2009, but only if a specific appropriation for the implementation of the bill is provided in a general appropriations act of the 81st Legislature.