By Gutierrez                                    H.B. No. 1051

      75R625 JRD-D                           

                                A BILL TO BE ENTITLED

 1-1                                   AN ACT

 1-2     relating to requiring that proposed real property transactions

 1-3     between governmental bodies must be deliberated in an open meeting.

 1-4           BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF TEXAS:

 1-5           SECTION 1.  Section 551.072, Government Code, is amended to

 1-6     read as follows:

 1-7           Sec. 551.072.  DELIBERATION REGARDING REAL PROPERTY; CLOSED

 1-8     MEETING.  (a)  A governmental body may conduct a closed meeting to

 1-9     deliberate the purchase, exchange, lease, or value of real property

1-10     if deliberation in an open meeting would have a detrimental effect

1-11     on the position of the governmental body in negotiations with a

1-12     third person.

1-13           (b)  Subsection (a) does not apply if each party to the

1-14     proposed purchase, exchange, or lease is a governmental body.

1-15           SECTION 2.  This Act takes effect September 1, 1997.  The

1-16     change in law made by this Act applies only to a meeting conducted

1-17     on or after September 1, 1997.  A meeting conducted before

1-18     September 1, 1997, is covered by the law in effect when the meeting

1-19     was conducted, and the former law is continued in effect for that

1-20     purpose.  For purposes of this section, a meeting was conducted

1-21     before September 1, 1997, if any part of the meeting was conducted

1-22     before that date.

1-23           SECTION 3.  The importance of this legislation and the

1-24     crowded condition of the calendars in both houses create an

 2-1     emergency and an imperative public necessity that the

 2-2     constitutional rule requiring bills to be read on three several

 2-3     days in each house be suspended, and this rule is hereby suspended.