By Solomons                                           H.B. No. 2123
         76R7789 GWK-D                           
                                A BILL TO BE ENTITLED
 1-1                                   AN ACT
 1-2     relating to requiring the state to reimburse counties for the costs
 1-3     of confining certain state inmates.
 1-4           BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF TEXAS:
 1-5           SECTION 1.  Article 104.002, Code of Criminal Procedure, is
 1-6     amended by adding Subsection (e) to read as follows:
 1-7           (e)  A county that confines in the county jail an inmate who
 1-8     is the subject of a warrant issued under Section 508.251,
 1-9     Government Code, or an inmate who is awaiting transfer to the Texas
1-10     Department of Criminal Justice after a determination by a parole
1-11     panel or a designee of the Board of Pardons and Paroles under
1-12     Section 508.283, Government Code, is entitled to receive
1-13     compensation from the state for each day the inmate is confined in
1-14     the county jail, other than the first two days. The county promptly
1-15     shall inform the department that an inmate described by this
1-16     subsection is confined in the jail.  The department has a duty to
1-17     take custody of an inmate described by this subsection as soon as
1-18     the department receives notice under this subsection of the
1-19     confinement of the inmate in the county jail.  The department may
1-20     contract with a county to provide for the custody and care of an
1-21     inmate described by this subsection. On the first day of each
1-22     quarter of a county's fiscal year, the county judge shall certify
1-23     to the comptroller of public accounts each inmate and, for each
1-24     inmate, the number of days during the preceding fiscal quarter for
 2-1     which the county is entitled to compensation under this subsection.
 2-2     The comptroller shall issue to the commissioners court of the
 2-3     county a warrant in an amount computed for the preceding fiscal
 2-4     quarter by multiplying $35 by the total number of days certified by
 2-5     the county judge for all inmates or, if the comptroller determines
 2-6     that the total number of days certified by the county judge is
 2-7     inaccurate, by the total number of days determined by the
 2-8     comptroller to be an accurate statement of days to which the county
 2-9     is entitled to compensation.
2-10           SECTION 2.  A county is entitled to compensation from the
2-11     state under Article 104.002(e), Code of Criminal Procedure, as
2-12     added by this Act, only for the confinement of inmates on or after
2-13     the effective date of this Act.
2-14           SECTION 3.  The importance of this legislation and the
2-15     crowded condition of the calendars in both houses create an
2-16     emergency and an imperative public necessity that the
2-17     constitutional rule requiring bills to be read on three several
2-18     days in each house be suspended, and this rule is hereby suspended,
2-19     and that this Act take effect and be in force from and after its
2-20     passage, and it is so enacted.