78(R) HB 3443 Engrossed version

TO:	Honorable Teel Bivins, Chair, Senate Committee on Finance

FROM:	John Keel, Director, Legislative Budget Board

IN RE:	HB3443 by Pickett (Relating to statutory authority for certain governmental entities to take certain actions to permit the legislature to reduce appropriations to those agencies.), As Engrossed

The bill would authorize the Aerospace Commission, the Department of Economic Development, the Department of Housing and Community Affairs, the Lottery Commission, the Office of Rural Community Affairs, the Department of Transportation and the Workforce Commission to take specific actions to reduce expenditures to comply with reduced appropriations of the agency's state funds under Article VII of the General Appropriations Act. The bill would authorize each agency to reduce expenditures by consolidating reports or reporting electronically, extending the effective period of a license, entering into contracts, adopting additional eligibility requirements, communicating electronically, or adopting fees to cover costs of performing its duties.

The amounts of the required reductions would depend on the funding levels adopted in the General Appropriations Act by the 78th Legislature and any savings compared to the 2002-03 budget may already be contained in HB1 as Engrossed, and are therefore not considered in this fiscal note.
However, it is assumed the reductions required would not be significant or the affected agency could implement the provisions of the bill within the agency's current resources.

The bill would take effect immediately if it received a vote of two-thirds of all the members elected to each house of the Legislature, otherwise it would take effect September 1, 2003.

LEGISLATIVE BUDGET BOARD
Austin, Texas

FISCAL NOTE, 78TH LEGISLATIVE REGULAR SESSION


May 12, 2003