S.B. No. 1414
                                        AN ACT
    1-1  relating to administrative hearings under the Alcoholic Beverage
    1-2  Code.
    1-3        BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF TEXAS:
    1-4        SECTION 1.  Section 5.43, Alcoholic Beverage Code, is amended
    1-5  to read as follows:
    1-6        Sec. 5.43.  Who May Hold Hearing; Rules of Evidence.
    1-7  (a)  Except as provided by Subsection (b) for a hearing held under
    1-8  Section 61.32 of this code, a hearing on the adoption of commission
    1-9  rules, or a hearing on an employment matter, the commission
   1-10  designates the State Office of Administrative Hearings to conduct
   1-11  and make a record of any hearing authorized by this code.  If the
   1-12  commission or administrator declares a hearing to be an emergency,
   1-13  the State Office of Administrative Hearings shall assign an
   1-14  administrative law judge or may contract with a qualified
   1-15  individual within five days and set a hearing as soon as possible.
   1-16        (b)  The commission or administrator may render a decision on
   1-17  the basis of the record or the proposal for decision if one is
   1-18  required under the administrative procedure law, Chapter 2001,
   1-19  Government Code, <Administrative Procedure and Texas Register Act
   1-20  (Article 6252-13a, Vernon's Texas Civil Statutes)> as if the
   1-21  administrator or entire commission had conducted the hearing.  The
   1-22  commission may prescribe its rules of procedure for cases not heard
   1-23  by the State Office of Administrative Hearings.
   1-24        SECTION 2.  The importance of this legislation and the
    2-1  crowded condition of the calendars in both houses create an
    2-2  emergency and an imperative public necessity that the
    2-3  constitutional rule requiring bills to be read on three several
    2-4  days in each house be suspended, and this rule is hereby suspended,
    2-5  and that this Act take effect and be in force from and after its
    2-6  passage, and it is so enacted.