By Sibley                                             S.B. No. 1293
       74R7991 JSA-D
                                 A BILL TO BE ENTITLED
    1-1                                AN ACT
    1-2  relating to senate apportionment and the staggering of senate
    1-3  terms.
    1-4        BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF TEXAS:
    1-5        SECTION 1.  Subchapter A, Chapter 301, Government Code, is
    1-6  amended by adding Sections 301.008 and 301.009 to read as follows:
    1-7        Sec. 301.008.  STAGGERING OF SENATE TERMS.  (a)  The
    1-8  staggered terms for members of the senate established under Section
    1-9  3, Article III, Texas Constitution, after each decennial
   1-10  apportionment of the senate shall be maintained until the
   1-11  apportionment of the senate following the publication of the next
   1-12  federal decennial census.
   1-13        (b)  If a senate district is changed after a decennial
   1-14  apportionment of the senate and before the next decennial
   1-15  apportionment, an election shall be held in the district at the
   1-16  next general election for which the change is effective.  If the
   1-17  election occurs at the end of a two-year or four-year term
   1-18  established for the district after the decennial apportionment, the
   1-19  senator elected in the district after the change serves a four-year
   1-20  term.  If the election occurs at the end of the second year of a
   1-21  four-year term established for the district after the decennial
   1-22  apportionment, the senator elected in the district after the change
   1-23  serves only the remaining two years of that four-year term.  The
   1-24  terms of the senators elected from districts that are not changed
    2-1  are not affected by a change in the other districts.
    2-2        Sec. 301.009.  SENATE DISTRICTS.  (a)  In any act of the
    2-3  legislature or Legislative Redistricting Board apportioning the
    2-4  districts of the senate, the districts shall be numbered using
    2-5  whole numbers beginning with District 1.
    2-6        (b)  A senate district may not be changed so that, according
    2-7  to the most recent federal decennial census, more than eight
    2-8  percent of the population of the district is in territory that was
    2-9  not in the district as it existed at the most recent general
   2-10  election unless the change is necessary to comply with federal law
   2-11  or a provision of the Texas Constitution, in which event the
   2-12  district may not be changed more than reasonably necessary to
   2-13  comply with that law or provision.
   2-14        SECTION 2.  (a)  Section 301.008, Government Code, as added
   2-15  by Section 1 of this Act applies to a change in senate districts
   2-16  made on or after January 1, 1995.
   2-17        (b)  Section 301.009, Government Code, as added by Section 1
   2-18  of this Act, applies to a change in senate districts made on or
   2-19  after the effective date of this Act.
   2-20        SECTION 3.  The importance of this legislation and the
   2-21  crowded condition of the calendars in both houses create an
   2-22  emergency and an imperative public necessity that the
   2-23  constitutional rule requiring bills to be read on three several
   2-24  days in each house be suspended, and this rule is hereby suspended,
   2-25  and that this Act take effect and be in force from and after its
   2-26  passage, and it is so enacted.