By Reyna of Bexar                                      H.B. No. 625
         76R8571 CMR-D                           
                                A BILL TO BE ENTITLED
 1-1                                   AN ACT
 1-2     relating to the hearing date on an adoption.
 1-3           BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF TEXAS:
 1-4           SECTION 1.  Section 162.004, Family Code, as amended by
 1-5     Section 74, Chapter 751, and  Section 1, Chapter 908, Acts of the
 1-6     74th Legislature, Regular Session, 1995, is reenacted and amended
 1-7     to read as follows:
 1-8           Sec. 162.004.  TIME FOR HEARING.  (a)  The court shall set
 1-9     the date for the hearing on the adoption at a time not before the
1-10     40th day [or later than the 60th day] after the later of the date
1-11     the social study is ordered or the date criminal history record
1-12     information is requested under Section 162.0085.
1-13           (b)  The [For good cause shown, the] court may set the
1-14     hearing at any time before the time provided by Subsection (a) if
1-15     the hearing date [that] provides adequate time for filing the
1-16     social study and notifying the court of the criminal history record
1-17     information for a person seeking to adopt the child.
1-18           SECTION 2.  This Act takes effect September 1, 1999, and
1-19     applies only to a suit for adoption filed on or after that date.  A
1-20     suit for adoption filed before the effective date of this Act is
1-21     governed by the law in effect at the time the suit was filed, and
1-22     the former law is continued in effect for that purpose.
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.