1-1 By: Zaffirini S.B. No. 444
1-2 (In the Senate - Filed February 5, 1997; February 10, 1997,
1-3 read first time and referred to Committee on Health and Human
1-4 Services; February 19, 1997, reported favorably by the following
1-5 vote: Yeas 10, Nays 0; February 19, 1997, sent to printer.)
1-6 A BILL TO BE ENTITLED
1-7 AN ACT
1-8 relating to administration of vital statistics records.
1-9 BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF TEXAS:
1-10 SECTION 1. Subsection (d), Section 191.025, Health and
1-11 Safety Code, is amended to read as follows:
1-12 (d) Information required on a certificate must be written
1-13 legibly in durable blue or black ink or may be filed and registered
1-14 by photographic, electronic, or other means as prescribed by the
1-15 state registrar.
1-16 SECTION 2. Section 191.026, Health and Safety Code, is
1-17 amended by amending Subsection (c) and adding Subsection (e) to
1-18 read as follows:
1-19 (c) The local registrar shall copy in the record book
1-20 required under Section 191.025 each certificate that the local
1-21 registrar registers, unless the local registrar keeps duplicates
1-22 under Subsection (d) or makes photographic duplications as
1-23 authorized by Chapter 181 or 201, Local Government Code. Except as
1-24 provided by Subsection (e), the [The] copies shall be permanently
1-25 preserved in the local registrar's office as the local record, in
1-26 the manner directed by the state registrar.
1-27 (e) The local registrar may, after the first anniversary of
1-28 the date of registration of a birth, death, or fetal death, destroy
1-29 the permanent record of the birth, death, or fetal death maintained
1-30 by the local registrar if:
1-31 (1) the local registrar has access to electronic
1-32 records of births, deaths, and fetal deaths maintained by the
1-33 bureau of vital statistics; and
1-34 (2) before destroying the records, the local registrar
1-35 certifies to the state registrar that each record maintained by the
1-36 local office that is to be destroyed has been verified against the
1-37 records contained in the bureau's database and that each record is
1-38 included in the database or otherwise accounted for.
1-39 SECTION 3. Section 191.035, Health and Safety Code, is
1-40 repealed.
1-41 SECTION 4. The importance of this legislation and the
1-42 crowded condition of the calendars in both houses create an
1-43 emergency and an imperative public necessity that the
1-44 constitutional rule requiring bills to be read on three several
1-45 days in each house be suspended, and this rule is hereby suspended,
1-46 and that this Act take effect and be in force from and after its
1-47 passage, and it is so enacted.
1-48 * * * * *