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House Bill 590 |
House Author: Delisi |
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Effective: 9-1-07 |
Senate Sponsor: Zaffirini |
House Bill 590 amends Government Code provisions relating to standards of conduct for state officers and employees. The bill provides that a state employee who violates certain standards of conduct specified in state law or an ethics policy adopted by the employing state agency is subject to termination of employment or other sanction, as well as to any applicable civil or criminal penalty. It further provides for the notification and involvement of the Texas Ethics Commission (TEC) in a related criminal investigation.
The bill requires each state agency to adopt and distribute to its employees, not later than January 1, 2008, a written ethics policy and to provide the policy to each new employee within a certain time frame. The bill requires the office of the attorney general, in coordination with the TEC, to develop and distribute, not later than November 1, 2007, a model ethics policy that a state agency may use in developing its policy.