1-1  By:  Leedom                                             S.B. No. 91
    1-2        (In the Senate - Filed November 22, 1994; January 11, 1995,
    1-3  read first time and referred to Committee on State Affairs;
    1-4  February 6, 1995, reported favorably by the following vote:  Yeas
    1-5  13, Nays 0; February 6, 1995, sent to printer.)
    1-6                         A BILL TO BE ENTITLED
    1-7                                AN ACT
    1-8  relating to disability retirement under the Employees Retirement
    1-9  System of Texas.
   1-10        BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF TEXAS:
   1-11        SECTION 1.  Subdivision (12), Section 811.001, Government
   1-12  Code, is amended to read as follows:
   1-13              (12)  "Occupational death or disability" means death or
   1-14  disability from:
   1-15                    (A)  an injury <or disease> that directly results
   1-16  from a specific act or occurrence determinable by a definite time
   1-17  and place, and directly results from an inherent risk or hazard
   1-18  peculiar to a duty that arises from and in the course of state
   1-19  employment; or
   1-20                    (B)  a disease that directly results from an
   1-21  inherent risk or hazard peculiar to a duty that arises from and in
   1-22  the course of state employment.
   1-23        SECTION 2.  (a)  A disability retiree of the Employees
   1-24  Retirement System of Texas whose claim of an occupational
   1-25  disability was denied by the retirement system before the effective
   1-26  date of this Act is entitled to an administrative hearing to
   1-27  determine whether the person's disability would have been
   1-28  occupational under Subdivision (12), Section 811.001, Government
   1-29  Code, as amended by this Act, if that definition had been in effect
   1-30  at the time the disability was incurred.  A request for a hearing
   1-31  described by this subsection must be filed with the retirement
   1-32  system before January 1, 1997, or the right is waived.
   1-33        (b)  The Employees Retirement System of Texas shall mail to
   1-34  each disability retiree whose claim of an occupational disability
   1-35  was denied by the retirement system in the two years preceding the
   1-36  effective date of this Act a notice of the right to a hearing under
   1-37  this section.
   1-38        (c)  After a hearing, if the Employees Retirement System of
   1-39  Texas determines that the retiree's disability would have been
   1-40  considered occupational if Subdivision (12), Section 811.001,
   1-41  Government Code, as amended by this Act,  had been in effect at the
   1-42  time the disability was incurred, the retirement system shall
   1-43  recompute the retiree's annuity as an occupational disability
   1-44  retirement annuity of the same type as the annuity originally
   1-45  selected by the retiree.  The recomputed annuity becomes payable
   1-46  beginning with the first payment that becomes due after the
   1-47  redetermination is made of the nature of the disability.
   1-48        (d)  A person whose annuity is recomputed under this section
   1-49  is considered a retiree because of occupational disability for
   1-50  purposes of all programs administered by the Employees Retirement
   1-51  System of Texas.
   1-52        SECTION 3.  The importance of this legislation and the
   1-53  crowded condition of the calendars in both houses create an
   1-54  emergency and an imperative public necessity that the
   1-55  constitutional rule requiring bills to be read on three several
   1-56  days in each house be suspended, and this rule is hereby suspended,
   1-57  and that this Act take effect and be in force from and after its
   1-58  passage, and it is so enacted.
   1-59                               * * * * *