By Bailey H.B. No. 1573
76R5460 SMJ-D
A BILL TO BE ENTITLED
1-1 AN ACT
1-2 relating to the provision of water and sewer service in populous
1-3 counties; providing a penalty.
1-4 BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF TEXAS:
1-5 SECTION 1. Subchapter B, Chapter 412, Local Government Code,
1-6 is amended by adding Section 412.016 to read as follows:
1-7 Sec. 412.016. WATER AND SEWER SERVICE FOR UNINCORPORATED
1-8 AREA IN POPULOUS COUNTY. (a) This section applies only to the
1-9 unincorporated area that is located in a county with a population
1-10 of more than 2.8 million and in which a residential building
1-11 without water or sewer service is located.
1-12 (b) The commissioners court of the county by order shall
1-13 adopt a service plan that:
1-14 (1) identifies all residential buildings in the
1-15 unincorporated area that do not have water or sewer service;
1-16 (2) establishes a procedure for providing water or
1-17 sewer service to the buildings;
1-18 (3) prescribes a 10-year timetable for providing the
1-19 water or sewer service using a reasonable priority system based on
1-20 the following factors:
1-21 (A) potential health hazards;
1-22 (B) population density;
1-23 (C) number of existing buildings;
1-24 (D) reasonable cost of providing the service;
2-1 and
2-2 (E) needs of residents;
2-3 (4) establishes a procedure for revising the service
2-4 plan at regular intervals to reflect changes in the factors
2-5 described by Subdivision (3); and
2-6 (5) includes a capital improvements plan that commits
2-7 the necessary financing.
2-8 (c) The service plan may:
2-9 (1) require property owners to connect to service
2-10 lines constructed to serve the area in which their property is
2-11 located; and
2-12 (2) relieve the county from an obligation to provide
2-13 water or sewer service to buildings in an area if a majority of
2-14 residents in the area sign and submit a petition to the
2-15 commissioners court stating they do not want to receive water or
2-16 sewer service from the county.
2-17 (d) A county shall provide water or sewer service as
2-18 provided by the service plan on or before:
2-19 (1) January 1, 2010, if the county has the population
2-20 prescribed by Subsection (a) under the 1990 federal decennial
2-21 census; or
2-22 (2) the 10th anniversary of the date on which the
2-23 official data of the federal decennial census is made public by the
2-24 United States Bureau of the Census showing that the county has the
2-25 population prescribed by Subsection (a), if the county first
2-26 acquires that population under a federal decennial census after the
2-27 1990 census.
3-1 (e) The Texas Natural Resource Conservation Commission shall
3-2 impose an administrative penalty on a county of $1,000 for each day
3-3 following the deadline provided by Subsection (d) that a county
3-4 fails to comply with this section. The commission shall deposit
3-5 the penalty to the credit of the water resource management account
3-6 to be used to provide water or sewer service to residents of the
3-7 county. The commission shall adopt procedures necessary to
3-8 implement this subsection.
3-9 SECTION 2. A county that on the effective date of this Act
3-10 is subject to Section 412.016, Local Government Code, as added by
3-11 this Act, shall adopt a service plan as provided by that section on
3-12 or before January 1, 2000.
3-13 SECTION 3. The importance of this legislation and the
3-14 crowded condition of the calendars in both houses create an
3-15 emergency and an imperative public necessity that the
3-16 constitutional rule requiring bills to be read on three several
3-17 days in each house be suspended, and this rule is hereby suspended,
3-18 and that this Act take effect and be in force from and after its
3-19 passage, and it is so enacted.