SRC-CTC H.B. 3591 77(R) BILL ANALYSIS Senate Research Center H.B. 3591 77R9929 MCK-FBy: Hunter (Bivins) Business & Commerce 5/9/2001 Engrossed DIGEST AND PURPOSE An academic statewide resource sharing project entitled TexShare was first funded in Fiscal Year 1994 under the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board. The 53 publicly supported four-year academic and medical libraries were original TexShare members. In the 75th Legislature, legislation was passed that expanded TexShare membership to independent academic institutions and community colleges, and established TexShare as a program of the Texas State Library and Archives Commission. During the 76th Legislature, legislation was passed which brought public libraries into TexShare, and in September 1999, the State Library assumed full administrative responsibility for TexShare. Currently, TexShare is managing the transition from a resource sharing program focused on academic institutions to one that fosters resource sharing among all academic and public libraries. H.B. 3591 expands membership in TexShare to include nonprofit libraries that provide extensive library services and collections in the fields of clinical medicine and the history of medicine. RULEMAKING AUTHORITY This bill does not expressly grant any additional rulemaking authority to a state officer, institution, or agency. SECTION BY SECTION ANALYSIS SECTION 1. Amends Section 441.221, Government Code, to define "nonprofit corporation." SECTION 2. Amends Section 441.222, Government Code, to require the Texas State Library and Archives Commission (commission) to establish and maintain the TexShare consortium as a resourcesharing consortium operated as a program within the commission for, among others, libraries of nonprofit corporations. SECTION 3. Amends Section 441.223, Government Code, to provide that the legislature finds that it is necessary to assist libraries for nonprofit corporations to promote the public good by achieving certain public purposes. Includes the expansion of the availability of information about clinical medical research and the history of medicine among the stated methods for achieving public purposes. SECTION 4. Amends Section 441.224, Government Code, to make a conforming change. SECTION 5. Amends Section 441.226(f), Government Code, to authorize the advisory board of the commission to recommend to the commission that the consortium enter cooperative projects with entities other than nonprofit corporations. SECTION 6. Amends Section 57.042(6), Utilities Code, to redefine "library." SECTION 7. Requires the commission to add libraries of nonprofit corporations to the TexShare consortium as required by that Act only to the extent that the commission may efficiently do so without reducing service to libraries at institutions of higher education and public libraries. SECTION 8. Effective date: September 1, 2001.