BILL ANALYSIS

H.B. 115

By: Pickett

Public Safety

Committee Report (Unamended)

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE

Numerous county tax offices in Texas have enforcement divisions to monitor car dealers to ensure vehicle inventory taxes are paid, and to protect consumers from dealers who do not properly register a vehicle within the time allotted by law. These offices enforce laws relating to tampering with governmental records when a person attempts to register, renew, or transfer a vehicle by presenting a fraudulent insurance document and assist with vehicle title hearings or audits.

H.B. 115 authorizes a county assessor-collector to commission certain employees as peace officers. 

RULEMAKING AUTHORITY

It is the committee's opinion that this bill does not expressly grant any additional rulemaking authority to a state officer, department, agency, or institution.

ANALYSIS

H.B. 115 amends the Tax Code to authorize the assessor-collector for a county to commission as a peace officer an employee who is certified as qualified to be a peace officer by the Commission on Law Enforcement Officer Standards and Education and employed by the enforcement division, or the functional equivalent of the enforcement division, of the office of the tax-assessor collector, if the enforcement division or functional equivalent has been acknowledged and sanctioned by the county commissioners court. The bill grants to an employee commissioned as a peace officer under the provisions of the bill the powers, privileges, and immunities of a peace officer while carrying out the duties as an employee of the enforcement division, or the functional equivalent of the enforcement division, of the office of the tax assessor-collector.

H.B. 115 amends the Code of Criminal Procedure to add an officer commissioned by a tax assessor-collector as provided by the bill to the list of peace officers.

EFFECTIVE DATE

On passage, or, if the act does not receive the necessary vote, the act takes effect September 1, 2009.