By Salinas                                            H.B. No. 1346
         76R3183 JSA-D                           
                                A BILL TO BE ENTITLED
 1-1                                   AN ACT
 1-2     relating to the adoption of a junior college branch campus
 1-3     maintenance tax by certain counties and to financial assistance for
 1-4     establishing a branch campus.
 1-5           BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF TEXAS:
 1-6           SECTION 1.  Section 130.087(b), Education Code, is amended to
 1-7     read as follows:
 1-8           (b)  On presentation of a petition for an election to
 1-9     authorize a junior college district branch campus maintenance tax
1-10     signed by not fewer than five percent of the qualified voters of
1-11     the jurisdiction in which the proposed tax is to be levied, the
1-12     governing body of the school district or county, as applicable,
1-13     shall determine the legality and the genuineness of the petition
1-14     and, if it is determined to be legal and genuine, forward the
1-15     petition to the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board
1-16     [Coordinating Board, Texas College  and University System].  If the
1-17     legislature appropriates money to provide financial assistance to
1-18     the establishment of a public junior college branch campus in a
1-19     particular county, the governing body of that county or of any
1-20     county contiguous to that county, on its own motion and without the
1-21     presentation of a petition, may propose an election to authorize a
1-22     branch campus maintenance tax.  If the tax is not adopted in the
1-23     county in which the branch campus is to be established at a time
1-24     when the financial assistance is available, action by that county
 2-1     or any contiguous county to adopt the tax has no effect.
 2-2           SECTION 2.  Subchapter C, Chapter 61, Education Code, is
 2-3     amended by adding Section 61.0625 to read as follows:
 2-4           Sec. 61.0625.  FINANCIAL ASSISTANCE TO ESTABLISH JUNIOR
 2-5     COLLEGE BRANCH CAMPUS.  (a)  The board shall administer money
 2-6     appropriated to provide  financial assistance to the establishment
 2-7     of public junior college branch campuses and shall provide
 2-8     financial assistance to the extent the money is sufficient to cover
 2-9     costs and expenses incurred in establishing branch campuses
2-10     approved by the board.
2-11           (b)  If an appropriation is made to provide financial
2-12     assistance to the establishment of a branch campus in a particular
2-13     county, the board shall use the money to cover the costs and
2-14     expenses of establishing the branch campus, including the costs of
2-15     purchasing real property or constructing buildings or other
2-16     facilities, as directed by the governing body of the public junior
2-17     college district establishing the branch campus.
2-18           SECTION 3.  The importance of this legislation and the
2-19     crowded condition of the calendars in both houses create an
2-20     emergency and an imperative public necessity that the
2-21     constitutional rule requiring bills to be read on three several
2-22     days in each house be suspended, and this rule is hereby suspended,
2-23     and that this Act take effect and be in force from and after its
2-24     passage, and it is so enacted.