BILL ANALYSIS |
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C.S.H.B. 500 |
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By: Geren |
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General Investigating & Ethics |
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Committee Report (Substituted) |
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BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE
Interested parties contend that certain elected officials who while in office commit certain felonies arising from the official duties of that office should not receive payments from the public retirement system and should vacate office on final conviction of a felony so as not to erode the public's trust and confidence in public officials. C.S.H.B. 500 seeks to make certain public officials ineligible for service retirement annuities under the applicable public retirement system and to provide for such vacation of office.
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CRIMINAL JUSTICE IMPACT
It is the committee's opinion that this bill does not expressly create a criminal offense, increase the punishment for an existing criminal offense or category of offenses, or change the eligibility of a person for community supervision, parole, or mandatory supervision.
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RULEMAKING AUTHORITY
It is the committee's opinion that rulemaking authority is expressly granted to the governing body of a public retirement system in SECTION 3 of this bill.
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ANALYSIS
C.S.H.B. 500 amends the Government Code to make a member of the elected class of the Employees Retirement System of Texas (ERS) who is a member of the legislature or who is a person who holds a state office normally filled by statewide election and not included in the coverage of the Judicial Retirement System of Texas Plan One or the Judicial Retirement System of Texas Plan Two, or a person otherwise eligible for membership in a public retirement system wholly or partly because the person was elected or appointed to an elected office, ineligible to receive a service retirement annuity under the retirement system if the member is convicted of a qualifying felony committed while in office and arising directly from the official duties of that elected office. The bill defines a "qualifying felony" as any felony involving bribery; the embezzlement, extortion, or other theft of public money; perjury; coercion of public servant or voter; tampering with governmental record; misuse of official information; conspiracy or the attempt to commit any of those foregoing offenses; or abuse of official capacity. The bill requires the governmental entity to which a person convicted of a qualifying felony was elected or appointed to provide written notice of the conviction to the public retirement system in which the person is enrolled not later than the 30th day after the conviction. The bill requires such notice to comply with the administrative rules adopted by the governing body of the public retirement system under the bill's provisions. The bill requires a court to notify the applicable public retirement system of the terms of a conviction of a person convicted of a qualifying felony committed while in office and arising directly from the official duties of that elected office.
C.S.H.B. 500 requires an applicable retirement system to suspend payments of an annuity to a person the system determines is ineligible to receive the annuity under the bill's provisions on receipt of such a notice of conviction from a court or a governmental entity, any similar notice of a conviction of a qualifying felony from a U.S. district court or U.S. attorney, or any other information that the system determines by rule is sufficient to establish a conviction of a qualifying felony, but entitles a person whose conviction is overturned on appeal or who meets certain requirements for innocence under applicable Civil Practice and Remedies Code provisions to receive an amount equal to the accrued total of payments and interest earned on the payments withheld during the suspension period and authorizes such a person to resume receipt of annuity payments on payment to the retirement system of an amount equal to the contributions refunded to the person.
C.S.H.B. 500 entitles a member who is ineligible to receive a service retirement annuity under the bill's provisions to a refund of the member's service retirement annuity contributions, including interest earned on those contributions. The bill establishes that such refund is subject to an award of all or part of the member's service retirement annuity contributions to a former spouse, including as a just and right division of the contributions on divorce, payment of child support, or payment of spousal maintenance or contractual alimony.
C.S.H.B. 500 establishes that benefits payable to an alternate payee who is recognized by a qualified domestic relations order established before the bill's effective date are not affected by a member's ineligibility to receive a service retirement annuity under the bill's provisions. The bill authorizes such an alternate payee to exercise any choice the member could have exercised regarding the form of payment of the benefit.
C.S.H.B. 500 authorizes a court, on the conviction of a member for a qualifying felony and in the same manner as in a divorce or annulment proceeding, to make a just and right division of the member's service retirement annuity by awarding to the member's spouse all or part of the community property interest in the annuity forfeited by the member and requires a court, on such a conviction and if the member's service retirement annuity was partitioned or exchanged by written agreement of the spouses before the member's commission of the offense, to award the annuity forfeited by the member to the member's spouse as provided in the agreement. The bill establishes that the service retirement annuity so awarded to a convicted member's spouse is the separate property of that spouse and that the member's community interest in the annuity, if any, is forfeited. The bill prohibits an annuity so awarded to a member's spouse from being converted to community property. The bill establishes that a spouse of a member convicted of a qualifying felony who is convicted of the felony as a party to the offense, or of another qualifying offense arising out of the same criminal episode, forfeits the member's service retirement annuity and service retirement contributions to the same extent as the member.
C.S.H.B. 500 establishes that ineligibility for a service retirement annuity under the bill's provisions does not impair a person's right to any other retirement benefit for which the person is eligible and requires the governing body of a public retirement system to adopt rules and procedures to implement the bill's provisions relating to certain elected officials' ineligibility for a service retirement annuity.
C.S.H.B. 500 establishes that a member of the legislature, the governor, or a state elected official convicted of a felony vacates the member's, governor's, or official's office on the date the conviction becomes final.
C.S.H.B. 500 amends the Code of Criminal Procedure to require the judge in the trial of a qualifying felony, as defined by the bill, committed while in office and arising directly from the official duties of that elected office to make an affirmative finding of fact and enter the affirmative finding in the judgment in the case if the judge determines that the defendant is a member of the elected class of the Employees Retirement System of Texas (ERS) who is a member of the legislature or who is a person who holds a state office normally filled by statewide election and not included in the coverage of the Judicial Retirement System of Texas Plan One or the Judicial Retirement System of Texas Plan Two while a member of the ERS, or that the defendant is a holder of an elected office for which the defendant wholly or partly became eligible for membership in a public retirement system. The bill requires a judge who makes such an affirmative finding to make the determination and provide notice to the applicable public retirement system as required by the bill's provisions.
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EFFECTIVE DATE
On passage, or, if the bill does not receive the necessary vote, September 1, 2017.
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COMPARISON OF ORIGINAL AND SUBSTITUTE
While C.S.H.B. 500 may differ from the original in minor or nonsubstantive ways, the following comparison is organized and formatted in a manner that indicates the substantial differences between the introduced and committee substitute versions of the bill.
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