By Ellis                                              H.B. No. 2590
         76R6241 GCH-F                           
                                A BILL TO BE ENTITLED
 1-1                                   AN ACT
 1-2     relating to compensatory time accumulated by state employees.
 1-3           BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF TEXAS:
 1-4           SECTION 1.  Subchapter F, Chapter 661, Government Code, is
 1-5     amended by adding Section 661.152 to read as follows:
 1-6           Sec. 661.152.  EMPLOYEE COMPENSATORY TIME.  (a)  In this
 1-7     section "employee" and "state agency" have the meanings assigned by
 1-8     Section 661.001.
 1-9           (b)  Notwithstanding any contrary provision in the General
1-10     Appropriations Act or other law, an employee of a state agency who
1-11     accrues compensatory time and is unable to take the time off
1-12     because of the agency's staffing requirements is not subject to any
1-13     limitation on the amount of unused compensatory time that may be
1-14     accumulated or transferred from one fiscal year to the next.  The
1-15     state agency may deduct from an employee's accumulated compensatory
1-16     time only time the employee takes off.
1-17           (c)  If an employee leaves employment with the state agency,
1-18     the agency shall pay the employee or the employee's estate, as
1-19     applicable, for all the employee's unused compensatory time at a
1-20     rate equal to the hourly rate of pay earned by the employee on the
1-21     last day of employment with the agency.
1-22           SECTION 2.  This Act takes effect September 1, 1999, and
1-23     applies only to compensatory time accrued by an employee of a state
1-24     agency while employed by the agency on or after that date.
 2-1           SECTION 3.  The importance of this legislation and the
 2-2     crowded condition of the calendars in both houses create an
 2-3     emergency and an imperative public necessity that the
 2-4     constitutional rule requiring bills to be read on three several
 2-5     days in each house be suspended, and this rule is hereby suspended.