By:  Puente                                            H.B. No. 458
       73R1686 SOS-D
                                 A BILL TO BE ENTITLED
    1-1                                AN ACT
    1-2  relating to the application for monthly survivor benefits under the
    1-3  Teacher Retirement System of Texas for certain persons whose
    1-4  remarriage disqualified them from those benefits.
    1-5        BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF TEXAS:
    1-6        SECTION 1.  Subchapter E, Chapter 824, Government Code, is
    1-7  amended by adding Section 824.4041 to read as follows:
    1-8        Sec. 824.4041.  BENEFITS FOR CERTAIN SURVIVING SPOUSES.  (a)
    1-9  A person is eligible to receive benefits under this section if the
   1-10  person:
   1-11              (1)  is the designated beneficiary of a deceased
   1-12  member;
   1-13              (2)  elected before September 1, 1980, to receive for
   1-14  life a monthly benefit of $75 beginning at the age of 65;
   1-15              (3)  became ineligible for the benefits because the
   1-16  person remarried before September 1, 1980; and
   1-17              (4)  reapplies for benefits under this section.
   1-18        (b)  The retirement system shall:
   1-19              (1)  verify whether a person is eligible to receive
   1-20  benefits under this section;
   1-21              (2)  determine the number of months that the person was
   1-22  65 years of age or older and did not receive the monthly survivor
   1-23  benefit during the period beginning on the date the person
   1-24  remarried, if before August 31, 1979, and ending August 31, 1979,
    2-1  and multiply that number by $75;
    2-2              (3)  determine the number of months that the person was
    2-3  65 years of age or older and did not receive the monthly survivor
    2-4  benefit during the period beginning on the date the person
    2-5  remarried or September 1, 1979, whichever date is later, and ending
    2-6  on the last day of the month in which the person is verified as
    2-7  eligible for benefits under this section, and multiply that number
    2-8  by $100; and
    2-9              (4)  make payable to the eligible person in a lump sum
   2-10  an amount equal to the amount computed under Subdivision (2) plus
   2-11  the amount computed under Subdivision (3).
   2-12        (c)  A person who receives a payment under this section is
   2-13  eligible, beginning with the month after the month in which the
   2-14  person is verified as eligible for benefits under this section, for
   2-15  a benefit as provided by Section 824.404.
   2-16        SECTION 2.  The importance of this legislation and the
   2-17  crowded condition of the calendars in both houses create an
   2-18  emergency and an imperative public necessity that the
   2-19  constitutional rule requiring bills to be read on three several
   2-20  days in each house be suspended, and this rule is hereby suspended,
   2-21  and that this Act take effect and be in force from and after its
   2-22  passage, and it is so enacted.