By Hightower                                          H.B. No. 1979
                                 A BILL TO BE ENTITLED
    1-1                                AN ACT
    1-2  relating to the procedures for selling state property under the
    1-3  management and control of the Texas Board of Criminal Justice.
    1-4        BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF TEXAS:
    1-5        SECTION 1.  Subchapter A, Chapter 496, Government Code, is
    1-6  amended by adding Section 496.0021 to read as follows:
    1-7        Sec. 496.0021.  SALE OF DEPARTMENT REAL PROPERTY.  (a)  The
    1-8  board may sell state-owned real property under the board's
    1-9  management and control at the real property's fair market value.
   1-10  The General Land Office shall negotiate and close a transaction
   1-11  under this section on behalf of the board using procedures under
   1-12  Section 31.158(c), Natural Resources Code.  Proceeds from the
   1-13  transaction shall be deposited in the Texas capital trust fund.
   1-14        (b)  The board may authorize the sale of land directly to a
   1-15  local government at fair market value without the requirement of a
   1-16  sealed bid sale if the local government acquires the property for
   1-17  use as a local correctional facility.
   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.