By:  Whitmire                                          S.B. No. 719
       73R4387 JRD-D
                                 A BILL TO BE ENTITLED
    1-1                                AN ACT
    1-2  relating to expunging the records of an overturned disciplinary
    1-3  action taken against a fire fighter or police officer in certain
    1-4  municipalities.
    1-5        BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF TEXAS:
    1-6        SECTION 1.  Subchapter G, Chapter 143, Local Government Code,
    1-7  is amended by adding Section 143.1214 to read as follows:
    1-8        Sec. 143.1214.  EXPUNGING RECORD OF OVERTURNED DISCIPLINARY
    1-9  ACTION.  The department head promptly shall order that the records
   1-10  of a disciplinary action that was taken against a fire fighter or
   1-11  police officer be expunged from each file maintained on the fire
   1-12  fighter or police officer by the department if the disciplinary
   1-13  action was overturned on appeal by the commission, an independent
   1-14  third party hearing examiner, or a court of competent jurisdiction.
   1-15  This section does not apply if the disciplinary action was only
   1-16  reduced and not overturned, but the issue of back pay is not
   1-17  considered in determining whether a disciplinary action was
   1-18  overturned for purposes of this section.
   1-19        SECTION 2.  Section 143.1214, Local Government Code, as added
   1-20  by this Act, applies according to its terms to a disciplinary
   1-21  action that is overturned before, on, or after the effective date
   1-22  of this Act.
   1-23        SECTION 3.  The importance of this legislation and the
   1-24  crowded condition of the calendars in both houses create an
    2-1  emergency and an imperative public necessity that the
    2-2  constitutional rule requiring bills to be read on three several
    2-3  days in each house be suspended, and this rule is hereby suspended,
    2-4  and that this Act take effect and be in force from and after its
    2-5  passage, and it is so enacted.