73R7253 CAG-F
          By Jones of Lubbock                                   H.B. No. 1601
                                 A BILL TO BE ENTITLED
    1-1                                AN ACT
    1-2  relating to the disclosure of applications for petitions for a
    1-3  local option election on the sale of alcoholic beverages and to the
    1-4  disclosure of those petitions in certain counties.
    1-5        BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF TEXAS:
    1-6        SECTION 1.  Subchapter A, Chapter 251, Alcoholic Beverage
    1-7  Code, is amended by adding Section 251.18 to read as follows:
    1-8        Sec. 251.18.  APPLICATIONS AND PETITIONS AS PUBLIC
    1-9  INFORMATION IN CERTAIN COUNTIES.  (a)  This section applies only to
   1-10  a county that has a municipality with a population of 185,000 or
   1-11  more in which the sale of mixed beverages by a permittee is legal
   1-12  and the sale of alcoholic beverages for off-premises consumption is
   1-13  not legal.  This section continues to apply to a county subject to
   1-14  it regardless of the results of an election to legalize or prohibit
   1-15  the sale of mixed beverages or of alcoholic beverages for
   1-16  off-premises consumption.
   1-17        (b)  An application for a petition, a petition, and the
   1-18  signatures on an application or petition are public information and
   1-19  open for inspection.  A copy of an application or petition shall be
   1-20  made available within the same business day of the request to any
   1-21  person requesting it.  The person or official who has custody of
   1-22  the document may charge a reasonable fee for making a copy of the
   1-23  document, not to exceed 25 cents per page.
   1-24        (c)  The county clerk shall print in capital letters and
    2-1  boldfaced type the following notice after the headings required on
    2-2  applications for petitions and petitions:  "NOTICE:  THIS DOCUMENT
    2-3  IS AVAILABLE FOR INSPECTION AT ANY TIME BY A SIGNER, AN INTERESTED
    2-4  PERSON, OR THE NEWS MEDIA.  STATE LAW REQUIRES THE PERSON HAVING
    2-5  CUSTODY OF THIS DOCUMENT TO PROVIDE A COPY WITHIN THE SAME BUSINESS
    2-6  DAY TO ANY PERSON MAKING A REQUEST.  THE CUSTODIAN MAY MAKE A
    2-7  REASONABLE CHARGE FOR THE COPY (NOT TO EXCEED 25 CENTS PER PAGE)."
    2-8        SECTION 2.  The importance of this legislation and the
    2-9  crowded condition of the calendars in both houses create an
   2-10  emergency and an imperative public necessity that the
   2-11  constitutional rule requiring bills to be read on three several
   2-12  days in each house be suspended, and this rule is hereby suspended,
   2-13  and that this Act take effect and be in force from and after its
   2-14  passage, and it is so enacted.