BILL ANALYSIS

S.B. 658

By: Perry

Judiciary & Civil Jurisprudence

Committee Report (Unamended)

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE

Currently, attorneys who handle money for their clients participate in the Interest on Lawyers' Trust Accounts (IOLTA) Program by depositing these funds into an IOLTA bank account or other trust account. These accounts ensure that attorneys do not co-mingle client funds and that client funds can be adequately managed. In rare cases, an IOLTA or other trust account can become abandoned if any attorney cannot locate a client. In these situations, attorneys turn over abandoned accounts to the comptroller of public accounts as unclaimed property.

S.B. 658 seeks to allow unclaimed IOLTA and other trust funds to be transferred from the comptroller to the Texas Supreme Court's judicial fund to help support basic civil legal services.

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 rulemaking authority is expressly granted to the comptroller of public accounts and the Texas Supreme Court in SECTION 2 of this bill.

ANALYSIS

S.B. 658 amends the Property Code to require the comptroller of public accounts to deposit to the credit of the basic civil legal services account of the judicial fund money delivered to the comptroller as money in an abandoned account established as required by the Interest on Lawyers' Trust Accounts (IOLTA) program or as unclaimed or unidentified money in a client trust account established by an attorney or law firm. This deposit requirement does not apply to money paid or delivered to the reported owner by the comptroller following the voluntary waiver of the requirement to file a claim.

S.B. 658 restricts the appropriation of that deposited money to the Texas Supreme Court for use in programs approved by the supreme court that provide basic civil legal services to indigent persons. The bill requires the supreme court to reimburse the comptroller from the basic civil legal services account for the amount of any claim that the comptroller pays for money deposited to the credit of the account under the bill's provisions. The bill authorizes the supreme court to use money deposited as such to reimburse the comptroller.

S.B. 658 authorizes the comptroller and the supreme court to adopt rules necessary to implement the bill's provisions, which apply to money delivered to the comptroller on, before, or after the bill's effective date. The bill requires the comptroller to identify applicable money that was delivered before the bill's effective date and for which a claim has not been paid by the comptroller and that has not otherwise been paid or delivered to a reported owner by the comptroller and deposit the money to the credit of the basic civil legal services account in the judicial fund in accordance with the bill's provisions.

EFFECTIVE DATE

September 1, 2023.