By: Duncan S.B. No. 264
A BILL TO BE ENTITLED
AN ACT
1-1 relating to the probationary period for a police officer under the
1-2 municipal civil service law.
1-3 BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF TEXAS:
1-4 SECTION 1. Section 143.027, Local Government Code, is
1-5 amended to read as follows:
1-6 Sec. 143.027. PROBATIONARY PERIOD. (a) A person appointed
1-7 to a beginning position in the fire [or police] department must
1-8 serve a probationary period of one year beginning on that person's
1-9 date of employment as a fire fighter[, police officer,] or academy
1-10 trainee.
1-11 (b) A person appointed to a beginning position in the police
1-12 department must serve a probationary period beginning on the date
1-13 the person is commissioned as a police officer in the employing
1-14 police department and ending on the first anniversary of that date.
1-15 (c) During a fire fighter's or police officer's probationary
1-16 period, the department head shall discharge the person and remove
1-17 the person from the payroll if the person's appointment was not
1-18 regular or was not made in accordance with this chapter or the
1-19 commission rules.
1-20 (d) [(c)] During a fire fighter's or police officer's
1-21 probationary period, the person may not be prohibited from joining
1-22 or required to join an employee organization. Joining or not
1-23 joining an employee organization is not a ground for retaining or
1-24 not retaining a fire fighter or police officer serving a
2-1 probationary period.
2-2 (e) [(d)] A fire fighter or police officer who was appointed
2-3 in substantial compliance with this chapter and who serves the
2-4 entire probationary period automatically becomes a full-fledged
2-5 civil service employee and has full civil service protection.
2-6 (f) This section does not apply to a city with population of
2-7 1.5 million or more.
2-8 SECTION 2. This Act takes effect September 1, 1999, and
2-9 applies only to the probationary period of a person employed in a
2-10 beginning position in a police department on or after the effective
2-11 date of this Act. The probationary period of a person employed in
2-12 a beginning position in a police department before the effective
2-13 date of this Act is governed by the law as it existed immediately
2-14 before the effective date of this Act, and that law is continued in
2-15 effect for that purpose.
2-16 SECTION 3. The importance of this legislation and the
2-17 crowded condition of the calendars in both houses create an
2-18 emergency and an imperative public necessity that the
2-19 constitutional rule requiring bills to be read on three several
2-20 days in each house be suspended, and this rule is hereby suspended.