By:  Barrientos                                        S.B. No. 849
                                 A BILL TO BE ENTITLED
                                        AN ACT
    1-1  relating to the recovery of reasonable attorney's fees by the state
    1-2  in proceedings under Chapter 21, Labor Code.
    1-3        BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF TEXAS:
    1-4        SECTION 1.  Subsection (a), Section 21.259, Labor Code, is
    1-5  amended to read as follows:
    1-6        (a)  In a proceeding under this chapter, a court may allow
    1-7  the prevailing party<, other than the commission,> a reasonable
    1-8  attorney's fee as part of the costs.
    1-9        SECTION 2.  This Act takes effect September 1, 1995, and
   1-10  applies only to a complaint filed with the Commission on Human
   1-11  Rights on or after that date.  A complaint filed before that date
   1-12  is governed by the law in effect on the date the complaint was
   1-13  filed, and the former law is continued in effect for that purpose.
   1-14        SECTION 3.  The importance of this legislation and the
   1-15  crowded condition of the calendars in both houses create an
   1-16  emergency and an imperative public necessity that the
   1-17  constitutional rule requiring bills to be read on three several
   1-18  days in each house be suspended, and this rule is hereby suspended.