By:  Shapleigh                                        S.B. No. 1079
                                A BILL TO BE ENTITLED
                                       AN ACT
 1-1     relating to the duties of the office of the attorney general with
 1-2     regard to the public information law.
 1-3           BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF TEXAS:
 1-4           SECTION 1.  Subchapter A, Chapter 552, Government Code, is
 1-5     amended by adding Section 552.009 to read as follows:
 1-6           Sec. 552.009.  TOLL-FREE NUMBER; ATTORNEY GENERAL'S OFFICE.
 1-7     The attorney general shall provide a statewide toll-free number by
 1-8     which members of the public may contact the open records division
 1-9     of the office of the attorney general.  Each governmental body
1-10     shall post the number at the place that the governmental body is
1-11     required to post a notice of a meeting under Chapter 551.  A
1-12     governmental body that is not subject to Chapter 551 shall post the
1-13     number at a place convenient to the public in or by the
1-14     administrative offices of the governmental body.  A governmental
1-15     body shall post with the toll-free number a brief description, to
1-16     be prescribed by the attorney general, of the division's function.
1-17           SECTION 2.  Section 552.321, Government Code, is amended to
1-18     read as follows:
1-19           Sec. 552.321. SUIT FOR WRIT OF MANDAMUS.  A requestor or the
1-20     attorney general may file suit for a writ of mandamus compelling a
1-21     governmental body to make information available for public
1-22     inspection if the governmental body refuses to request an attorney
1-23     general's decision as provided by Subchapter G  or refuses to
1-24     supply public information that is not excepted from required
 2-1     disclosure or information that the attorney general has determined
 2-2     is public information that is not excepted from required
 2-3     disclosure.
 2-4           SECTION 3.  The importance of this legislation and the
 2-5     crowded condition of the calendars in both houses create an
 2-6     emergency and an imperative public necessity that the
 2-7     constitutional rule requiring bills to be read on three several
 2-8     days in each house be suspended, and this rule is hereby suspended,
 2-9     and that this Act take effect and be in force from and after its
2-10     passage, and it is so enacted.