BILL ANALYSIS

H.B. 2968

By: Frullo

Higher Education

Committee Report (Unamended)

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE

There are concerns about future availability of funding for the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board's student loan program due to certain annual limits on the issuance of bonds. H.B. 2968 seeks to address these concerns by increasing the coordinating board's bonding authority.

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.

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. 2968 amends the Government Code to increase from $50 million to $100 million the cap on the amount of a reservation of a portion of the ceiling on state debt that may be granted by the Bond Review Board before August 15 for any single project in a year if the issuer is an issuer of a state-voted issue of bonds other than the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board. The bill increases the cap from $75 million to $200 million if the issuer is the coordinating board. The bill raises the cap from eight percent to 10 percent of the state ceiling that may be removed from availability to issuers that are not issuers of state-voted issues if applications to reserve a portion of the state ceiling for state-voted issues total a certain percentage before January 2. The bill extends the deadline by which an issuer of state-voted issues or an issuer of qualified mortgage revenue bonds is required to close on the bonds for which the reservation was granted from not later than the 180th day after the reservation date to not later than the 240th day after the reservation date.

EFFECTIVE DATE

September 1, 2019.