By Hilbert                                            H.B. No. 2966
         76R10175 KLA-F                           
                                A BILL TO BE ENTITLED
 1-1                                   AN ACT
 1-2     relating to the authority of certain hospital authorities to
 1-3     provide facilities and services for the elderly or disabled.
 1-4           BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF TEXAS:
 1-5           SECTION 1.  Section 262.034, Health and Safety Code, is
 1-6     amended by amending Subsection (e) and adding Subsection (g) to
 1-7     read as follows:
 1-8           (e)  This section applies only to an authority that owns or
 1-9     operates a hospital licensed under Chapter 241 and that is located
1-10     in:
1-11                 (1)  a county with a population of 35,000 or less;
1-12                 (2)  those portions of extended municipalities that the
1-13     federal census bureau has determined to be rural; [or]
1-14                 (3)  an area that is not delineated as an urbanized
1-15     area by the federal census bureau; or
1-16                 (4)  a municipality with a population of less than
1-17     12,000 and a county with a population of 2.5 million or more at the
1-18     time the authority begins operating a facility or providing a
1-19     service described by Subsection (a).
1-20           (g)  An authority described by Subsection (e)(4) may not own
1-21     or operate more than 50 licensed nursing home beds under this
1-22     section and is not  subject to Subsection (f).
1-23           SECTION 2.  This Act takes effect September 1, 1999.
1-24           SECTION 3.  The importance of this legislation and the
 2-1     crowded condition of the calendars in both houses create an
 2-2     emergency and an imperative public necessity that the
 2-3     constitutional rule requiring bills to be read on three several
 2-4     days in each house be suspended, and this rule is hereby suspended.