By:  Leedom                                            S.B. No. 793
       73R6385 GCH-D
                                 A BILL TO BE ENTITLED
    1-1                                AN ACT
    1-2  relating to disability retirement under the Employees Retirement
    1-3  System of Texas.
    1-4        BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF TEXAS:
    1-5        SECTION 1.  Section 811.001(12), Government Code, is amended
    1-6  to read as follows:
    1-7              (12)  "Occupational death or disability" means death or
    1-8  disability from:
    1-9                    (A)  an injury <or disease> that directly results
   1-10  from a specific act or occurrence determinable by a definite time
   1-11  and place, and directly results from an inherent risk or hazard
   1-12  peculiar to a duty that arises from and in the course of state
   1-13  employment; or
   1-14                    (B)  a disease that directly results from an
   1-15  inherent risk or hazard peculiar to a duty that arises from and in
   1-16  the course of state employment.
   1-17        SECTION 2.  (a)  A disability retiree of the Employees
   1-18  Retirement System of Texas whose claim of an occupational
   1-19  disability was denied by the retirement system before the effective
   1-20  date of this Act is entitled to an administrative hearing to
   1-21  determine whether the person's disability would have been
   1-22  occupational under Section 811.001(12), Government Code, as amended
   1-23  by this Act, if that definition had been in effect at the time the
   1-24  disability was incurred.  A request for a hearing described by this
    2-1  subsection must be filed with the retirement system before January
    2-2  1, 1995, or the right is waived.
    2-3        (b)  The Employees Retirement System of Texas shall mail to
    2-4  each disability retiree whose claim of an occupational disability
    2-5  was denied by the retirement system in the two years preceding the
    2-6  effective date of this Act a notice of the right to a hearing under
    2-7  this section.
    2-8        (c)  After a hearing, if the Employees Retirement System of
    2-9  Texas determines that the retiree's disability would have been
   2-10  considered occupational if Section 811.001(12), Government Code, as
   2-11  amended by this Act, had been in effect at the time the disability
   2-12  was incurred, the retirement system shall recompute the retiree's
   2-13  annuity as an occupational disability retirement annuity of the
   2-14  same type as the annuity originally selected by the retiree.  The
   2-15  recomputed annuity becomes payable beginning with the first payment
   2-16  that becomes due after the redetermination is made of the nature of
   2-17  the disability.
   2-18        (d)  A person whose annuity is recomputed under this section
   2-19  is considered a retiree because of occupational disability for
   2-20  purposes of all programs administered by the Employees Retirement
   2-21  System of Texas.
   2-22        SECTION 3.  The importance of this legislation and the
   2-23  crowded condition of the calendars in both houses create an
   2-24  emergency and an imperative public necessity that the
   2-25  constitutional rule requiring bills to be read on three several
   2-26  days in each house be suspended, and this rule is hereby suspended,
   2-27  and that this Act take effect and be in force from and after its
    3-1  passage, and it is so enacted.