1-1     By:  Madla                                             S.B. No. 254
 1-2           (In the Senate - Filed January 25, 1999; January 28, 1999,
 1-3     read first time and referred to Committee on Health Services;
 1-4     March 1, 1999, reported favorably by the following vote:  Yeas 5,
 1-5     Nays 0; March 1, 1999, sent to printer.)
 1-6                            A BILL TO BE ENTITLED
 1-7                                   AN ACT
 1-8     relating to the authority of the director of the Department of
 1-9     Public Safety of the State of Texas to permit the use of triplicate
1-10     or single prescription forms under the Texas Controlled Substances
1-11     Act.
1-12           BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF TEXAS:
1-13           SECTION 1.  Section 40, Chapter 745, Acts of the 75th
1-14     Legislature, Regular Session, 1997, is amended to read as follows:
1-15           Sec. 40.  The changes in law made by this Act relating to a
1-16     prescription written under the triplicate prescription program take
1-17     effect September 1, 1999, except that Section 481.0761, Health and
1-18     Safety Code, as added by this Act, takes effect September 1, 1997.
1-19     The director of the Department of Public Safety by rule may permit
1-20     the use of triplicate or single prescription forms during a period
1-21     of transition[, but not after March 1, 1999].
1-22           SECTION 2.  The importance of this legislation and the
1-23     crowded condition of the calendars in both houses create an
1-24     emergency and an imperative public necessity that the
1-25     constitutional rule requiring bills to be read on three several
1-26     days in each house be suspended, and this rule is hereby suspended,
1-27     and that this Act take effect and be in force from and after its
1-28     passage, and it is so enacted.
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