1-1     By:  Moncrief                                          S.B. No. 722

 1-2           (In the Senate - Filed February 24, 1997; February 26, 1997,

 1-3     read first time and referred to Committee on State Affairs;

 1-4     April 25, 1997, reported adversely, with favorable Committee

 1-5     Substitute by the following vote:  Yeas 13, Nays 0; April 25, 1997,

 1-6     sent to printer.)

 1-7     COMMITTEE SUBSTITUTE FOR S.B. No. 722                 By:  Gallegos

 1-8                            A BILL TO BE ENTITLED

 1-9                                   AN ACT

1-10     relating to the refusal of registration of motor vehicles by a

1-11     county assessor-collector or the Texas Department of Transportation

1-12     under certain conditions.

1-13           BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF TEXAS:

1-14           SECTION 1.  Subsections (a) and (c), Section 702.003,

1-15     Transportation Code, are amended to read as follows:

1-16           (a)  A county assessor-collector or the Texas Department of

1-17     Transportation [department] may refuse to register a motor vehicle

1-18     if the assessor-collector or the department receives under a

1-19     contract information from a municipality that the owner of the

1-20     vehicle has an outstanding warrant from that municipality for

1-21     failure to appear or failure to pay a fine on a complaint that

1-22     involves the violation of a traffic law and may also refuse to

1-23     register a motor vehicle if the assessor-collector or the

1-24     department receives under a contract information from a

1-25     municipality with a population of 440,000 or more located in a

1-26     county with more than 35 incorporated cities that the owner of the

1-27     vehicle has three or more unpaid parking tickets.

1-28           (c)  A municipality that has a contract under Subsection (b)

1-29     shall notify the county or the department regarding a person for

1-30     whom the county assessor-collector or the department has refused to

1-31     register a motor vehicle on:

1-32                 (1)  entry of a judgment against the person and the

1-33     person's payment to the court of the fine for the violation and of

1-34     all court costs;

1-35                 (2)  perfection of an appeal of the case for which the

1-36     arrest warrant was issued; [or]

1-37                 (3)  dismissal of the charge for which the arrest

1-38     warrant was issued; or

1-39                 (4)  dismissal of or the payment of parking citations

1-40     on the basis of which registration had been refused.

1-41           SECTION 2.  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.

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