By:  Brown                                             S.B. No. 898
                                A BILL TO BE ENTITLED
                                       AN ACT
 1-1     relating to grants from the water loan assistance fund for certain
 1-2     projects.
 1-3           BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF TEXAS:
 1-4           SECTION 1.  Subsection (b), Section 15.102, Water Code, is
 1-5     amended to read as follows:
 1-6           (b)  The board may use the loan fund [may also be used by the
 1-7     board] to provide grants for:
 1-8                 (1)  projects that include the provision of [supplying]
 1-9     water and wastewater services in economically distressed areas,
1-10     including projects involving retail distribution of those services;
1-11     and
1-12                 (2)  one or more of the following projects, if the
1-13     legislature appropriates money specifically for that purpose:
1-14                       (A)  agricultural water conservation;
1-15                       (B)  weather modification;
1-16                       (C)  brush control; or
1-17                       (D)  production of water in connection with an
1-18     oil or gas operation.
1-19           SECTION 2.  (a)  This Act takes effect September 1, 1999.
1-20           (b)  The change in law made by this Act applies only to an
1-21     application for a grant from the water loan assistance fund that is
1-22     filed on or after the effective date of this Act.  A grant
1-23     application that is filed before the effective date of this Act is
1-24     governed by the law in effect immediately before the effective date
 2-1     of this Act, and that law is continued in effect for that purpose.
 2-2           SECTION 3.  The importance of this legislation and the
 2-3     crowded condition of the calendars in both houses create an
 2-4     emergency and an imperative public necessity that the
 2-5     constitutional rule requiring bills to be read on three several
 2-6     days in each house be suspended, and this rule is hereby suspended.