By: Culberson H.B. No. 1616
73R3070 JJT-D
A BILL TO BE ENTITLED
1-1 AN ACT
1-2 relating to automobile emissions testing devices.
1-3 BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF TEXAS:
1-4 SECTION 1. Section 142, Uniform Act Regulating Traffic on
1-5 Highways (Article 6701d, Vernon's Texas Civil Statutes), is amended
1-6 by adding Subsection (d-2) and amending Subsection (e) to read as
1-7 follows:
1-8 (d-2) The Public Safety Commission, for any county in this
1-9 state for which the Texas Natural Resource Conservation Commission
1-10 has adopted a resolution requesting the Department to institute
1-11 such a program, shall establish a program using automated
1-12 automobile emissions testing devices to assess the exhaust
1-13 emissions of stationary or moving vehicles for pollution control
1-14 purposes. The emissions testing program may use automated or
1-15 remotely activated devices that are able to assess the quality,
1-16 content, or opacity of motor vehicle exhaust emissions and that are
1-17 linked to a camera designed to photograph the license plate of a
1-18 vehicle that emits exhaust that fails the testing criteria of the
1-19 device. The Public Safety Commission by mail may issue to the
1-20 owner of the vehicle a notice of violation, a citation, or a demand
1-21 that the vehicle photographed by an automated emissions testing
1-22 device report to an emissions inspection station. The Texas
1-23 Natural Resource Conservation Commission shall adopt criteria
1-24 consistent with the federal Clean Air Act Amendments of 1990 (Pub.
2-1 L. No. 101-549) and its subsequent amendments for the use of
2-2 automated devices under this subsection.
2-3 (e) The Public Safety Commission shall adopt standards for
2-4 emissions-related inspection criteria consistent with Texas Natural
2-5 Resource Conservation Commission and federal requirements
2-6 applicable to a county in which such a program, pursuant to
2-7 Subsections (d), <and> (d-1), and (d-2) of this section, is
2-8 established.
2-9 SECTION 2. This Act takes effect September 1, 1993.
2-10 SECTION 3. The importance of this legislation and the
2-11 crowded condition of the calendars in both houses create an
2-12 emergency and an imperative public necessity that the
2-13 constitutional rule requiring bills to be read on three several
2-14 days in each house be suspended, and this rule is hereby suspended.