By: Bivins S.B. No. 1340
A BILL TO BE ENTITLED
AN ACT
1-1 relating to the use of electronic transfer methods for unemployment
1-2 compensation insurance purposes.
1-3 BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF TEXAS:
1-4 SECTION 1. Section 9(c), Texas Unemployment Compensation Act
1-5 (Article 5221b-7, Vernon's Texas Civil Statutes), is amended to
1-6 read as follows:
1-7 (c) Withdrawals: Moneys requisitioned from this State's
1-8 account in the Unemployment Trust Fund shall be used exclusively
1-9 for the payment of benefits and for refunds pursuant to Section 14
1-10 and this Section, except that money credited to this State's
1-11 account pursuant to Section 903 of the Social Security Act, as
1-12 amended, may be requisitioned and used by the Commission only to
1-13 the extent and under the conditions prescribed by said Section 903,
1-14 as amended. The Commission shall from time to time requisition
1-15 from the Unemployment Trust Fund such amounts, not exceeding the
1-16 amounts standing to its account therein, as it deems necessary for
1-17 the payment of benefits and refunds for a reasonable future period.
1-18 Upon receipt thereof, the Treasurer shall deposit such moneys in
1-19 the benefit account, and the Comptroller shall issue his warrants
1-20 for payment of benefits solely from such benefit account.
1-21 Expenditures of such moneys in the benefit account, and refunds
1-22 from the clearing account, shall not be subject to any provision of
1-23 law which may require itemization or other formal release by State
1-24 officers of money in their custody. <All warrants issued for the
2-1 payment of benefits and refunds shall bear the signature of the
2-2 Treasurer and the countersignature of a member of the Commission,
2-3 or its duly authorized agent, for that purpose.> Any balance of
2-4 moneys requisitioned from the Unemployment Trust Fund which remains
2-5 unclaimed or unpaid in the benefit account after the expiration of
2-6 the period for which such sums were requisitioned, shall either be
2-7 deducted from estimates for, and may be utilized for the payment of
2-8 benefits and refunds during succeeding periods, or, in the
2-9 discretion of the Commission, shall be redeposited with the
2-10 Secretary of the Treasury of the United States of America, to the
2-11 credit of this State's account in the Unemployment Trust Fund as
2-12 provided in subsection (b) of this Section.
2-13 SECTION 2. Section 19, Texas Unemployment Compensation Act
2-14 (Article 5221b-17, Vernon's Texas Civil Statutes), is amended by
2-15 adding Subsections (r) and (s) to read as follows:
2-16 (r) "Mail" means the United States Postal Service or any
2-17 other method approved by the commission to provide actual notice,
2-18 including an electronic transfer system.
2-19 (s) "Warrant" means a written payment order or an electronic
2-20 payment order that is a part of an electronic fund transfer system
2-21 approved by the commission.
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.