By:  Naishtat                                         H.B. No. 2687
       73R4299 CAS-D
                                 A BILL TO BE ENTITLED
    1-1                                AN ACT
    1-2  relating  to interpreters for deaf and hearing impaired students in
    1-3  public schools.
    1-4        BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF TEXAS:
    1-5        SECTION 1.  Subchapter Z, Chapter 13, Education Code, is
    1-6  amended by adding Section 13.914 to read as follows:
    1-7        Sec. 13.914.  INTERPRETERS.  (a)  Beginning with the
    1-8  1997-1998 school year, an individual employed as an interpreter by
    1-9  a school district for a deaf or hearing impaired student must be
   1-10  certified as an interpreter by the Texas Commission for the Deaf
   1-11  and Hearing Impaired or have certification waived by the
   1-12  commission, as provided by Section 81.007, Human Resources Code.
   1-13        (b)  The State Board of Education, after consulting with the
   1-14  Texas Commission for the Deaf and Hearing Impaired, shall establish
   1-15  minimum salaries that interpreters employed by a school district
   1-16  shall be paid.  The minimum salaries shall be based on the levels
   1-17  of certification under Section 81.007, Human Resources Code.
   1-18        SECTION 2.  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,
   1-23  and that this Act take effect and be in force from and after its
   1-24  passage, and it is so enacted.