By Staples                                            H.B. No. 1947
         76R7848 MI-D                           
                                A BILL TO BE ENTITLED
 1-1                                   AN ACT
 1-2     relating to allowing a landowner to take a depredating fur-bearing
 1-3     animal without a hunting or trapping license.
 1-4           BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF TEXAS:
 1-5           SECTION 1.  Section 71.004(a), Parks and Wildlife Code, is
 1-6     amended to read as follows:
 1-7           (a)  No person may take, sell, purchase, or possess a
 1-8     fur-bearing animal, pelt, or carcass in this state, except as
 1-9     provided by proclamation of the commission.  This chapter does not
1-10     prohibit a landowner or his agent from taking a fur-bearing animal
1-11     causing depredation on that person's land.  A landowner or the
1-12     landowner's agent, without having a hunting license or a trapper's
1-13     license issued under this code, may take a fur-bearing animal that
1-14     is causing depredation on the landowner's land.  No person may
1-15     possess a fur-bearing animal taken for depredation purposes except
1-16     as authorized by proclamation of the commission.
1-17           SECTION 2.  This Act takes effect September 1, 1999.
1-18           SECTION 3.  The importance of this legislation and the
1-19     crowded condition of the calendars in both houses create an
1-20     emergency and an imperative public necessity that the
1-21     constitutional rule requiring bills to be read on three several
1-22     days in each house be suspended, and this rule is hereby suspended.