By:  Shapleigh, Lucio                                  S.B. No. 913
              Zaffirini, Duncan
                                A BILL TO BE ENTITLED
                                       AN ACT
 1-1     relating to the establishment and maintenance of one-stop border
 1-2     inspection stations by the Texas Department of Transportation in
 1-3     Brownsville, Laredo, and El Paso.
 1-4           BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF TEXAS:
 1-5           SECTION 1.  Subchapter H, Chapter 201, Transportation Code,
 1-6     is amended by adding Section 201.613 to read as follows:
 1-7           Sec. 201.613.  ONE-STOP BORDER INSPECTION STATIONS.  (a)  The
 1-8     department shall choose a location for an inspection station along
 1-9     a major highway at or near a border crossing from Mexico in
1-10     Brownsville, in Laredo, and in El Paso so that all federal, state,
1-11     and municipal agencies that regulate the passage of persons or
1-12     vehicles across the border at that border crossing may be located
1-13     in one place.
1-14           (b)  The department shall establish and maintain an
1-15     inspection station at the locations chosen in Subsection (a) only
1-16     if the federal agencies involved in the regulation of the passage
1-17     of persons or vehicles at that border crossing agree to the design
1-18     of the facility at each location and agree to use the facility at
1-19     each location if built.
1-20           (c)  The department may enter into agreements with federal,
1-21     state, and municipal agencies to accomplish the purpose of this
1-22     section.  An agreement may involve the lease of office space at the
1-23     inspection station by the department to the agency.
1-24           SECTION 2.  This Act takes effect only if a specific
 2-1     appropriation for the implementation of this Act is provided in
 2-2     H.B. No. 1 (General Appropriations Act), Acts of the 76th
 2-3     Legislature, Regular Session, 1999.  If no specific appropriation
 2-4     is provided in H.B. No. 1, the General Appropriations Act, this Act
 2-5     has no effect.
 2-6           SECTION 3.  The importance of this legislation and the
 2-7     crowded condition of the calendars in both houses create an
 2-8     emergency and an imperative public necessity that the
 2-9     constitutional rule requiring bills to be read on three several
2-10     days in each house be suspended, and this rule is hereby suspended,
2-11     and that this Act take effect and be in force from and after its
2-12     passage, and it is so enacted.