LEGISLATIVE BUDGET BOARD
                                   Austin, Texas
         
                                   FISCAL NOTE
                               75th Regular Session
         
                                  April 26, 1997
         
         
      TO: Honorable Rodney Ellis, Chair            IN RE:  Senate Bill No. 1594
          Committee on Jurisprudence                              By: Haywood
          Senate
          Austin, Texas
         
         
         
         
         FROM:  John Keel, Director    
         
In response to your request for a Fiscal Note on SB1594 ( Relating 
to the enforcement and collection of child support; providing 
a penalty.) this office has detemined the following:
         
         Biennial Net Impact to General Revenue Funds by SB1594-As Introduced
         

No significant fiscal implication to the State is anticipated.
         

         
 
The bill would amend various sections of the Family Code relating 
to collections of child support.

The bill would allow the 
clerk of the domestic relations court to collect a fee at the 
time a case is filed and remit it to the domestic relations 
office.   The bill would require the calculation of interest 
on unpaid child support obligations to begin as of the date 
the judgment is signed by the judge and would allow counties 
to transfer child support payments electronically.  The bill 
would allow information to be forwarded to the Texas Crime Information 
Center and the National Crime Information Center.  The bill 
would change the priority in which child support payments are 
applied, reversing the priority between interest and principle 
for the application of child support payments.

The provisions 
relating to the domestic relations office and the information 
which employers must furnish with their remittance of support 
payments withheld from an obligor's paycheck would take effect 
on January 1, 1998.  The remainder of the bill would take effect 
September 1, 1997.

The Office of the Attorney General estimates 
that changing the priority in which child support payments are 
applied would require modification to the financial component 
of the new child support computer system (TXCSES).  However, 
it is assumed that the cost could be absorbed within current 
funding.
          
No significant fiscal implication to units of local government 
is anticipated.
          
   Source:            Agencies:   501   Department of Health
                                         405   Department of Public Safety
                                         696   Department of Criminal Justice
                                         304   Comptroller of Public Accounts
                                         324   Department of Human Services
                                         302   Office of the Attorney General
                                         
                      LBB Staff:   JK ,BB ,CB ,JC