H.B. No. 1270
    1-1                                AN ACT
    1-2  relating to installment payments of ad valorem taxes imposed on the
    1-3  homestead of an elderly person.
    1-4        BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF TEXAS:
    1-5        SECTION 1.  Section 31.031(a), Tax Code, is amended to read
    1-6  as follows:
    1-7        (a) If before the delinquency date an individual who is at
    1-8  least 65 years of age claims the elderly homestead exemption and
    1-9  pays at least one-fourth of a taxing unit's taxes imposed on
   1-10  property that the person owns and occupies as a residence
   1-11  homestead, accompanied by notice to the taxing unit that the person
   1-12  will pay the remaining taxes in installments, the person may pay
   1-13  the remaining taxes without penalty or interest in three equal
   1-14  installments.  The first installment must be paid before April 1,
   1-15  the second installment before June 1, and the third installment
   1-16  before August 1.
   1-17        SECTION 2.  This Act takes effect September 1, 1993.
   1-18        SECTION 3.  The importance of this legislation and the
   1-19  crowded condition of the calendars in both houses create an
   1-20  emergency and an imperative public necessity that the
   1-21  constitutional rule requiring bills to be read on three several
   1-22  days in each house be suspended, and this rule is hereby suspended.