Travis County Commssioners Court
June 17, 2003
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Item 41
41. Consider steps and take appropriate action to measure impact of state approved budget on Travis County's budget and how to engage appropriate county departments. What I have in mind here is us requesting county departments to take a look at the state budget as well as other legislation over the next two to three weeks, with an eye toward determining programmatic and fiscal impact on Travis County. I do think we need a work session to discuss that. Many of the departments have followed the legislation throughout the session. Most of tm know what legislation passed and is what's on the government's desk and what legs did not. This is really my way of us formally requesting that departments start preparing for the work session where we will sit together and try to discuss impacts on Travis County. Our legislative consultants are doing pretty much the same thing with the budget bill. And other legislation that we had identified as priority legislation for us. But I'm thinking most of our priority legislation is stuff that we wanted or really thought that we should be on the alert for. There were other bills, though, especially during the last five days, that were passed that impacts us one way or the other. We need to do the best we can to identify those bills, assess them. And have that discussion so if we teed to take action, we can go ahead and do that.
>> judge, with the -- [indiscernible]
>> is it Monday?
>> 22nd.
>> if he doesn't get a chance to sign them they become law or whatever, that the schedule line -- is that the deadline for the governor is Monday?
>> Sunday.
>> Sunday. The 22nd, Sunday.
>> I think it kicks -- if it's midnight, if it's midnight Sunday that's what everybody calls Monday. [indiscernible] [multiple voices]
>> judge, tied into your -- us potentially having a work session, would you also envision that that work session would be kind of hike what we have always had in terms of an annual, biannual wrapup of what happened to the bills, you know, the legislative consultant normally puts together a summary of all of the things that we were tracking, the second tier things, et cetera, et cetera. It would be beyond simply just what did the budget -- what happened on the budget. Do you have a sense of when we are looking at a work session?
>> probably 3rd of July. We have one on the 26th. That's Thursday of next week. My guess is a week, two weeks after that. This item really is for us to correct and request county managers to become engaged.
>> sure.
>> the other thing for you to look at some of these, like justice and public safety, what happens in the parole division is not our responsibility directly, but we will be directly impacted. So it's really most likely to get ms. Pierce to contact the parole division see what kind of a hit they are taking because typically the fewer officers you have on the streets, the inclination to start arresting offenders and put them in county jail.
>> we need to have a clear understand knowledge, speaking of health insurance, had to do with whether the folks in cscd would be mandated to move over to the state health insurance because that -- I need to have a good understanding of what that really means related to -- related to our health insurance programs. So that's another one that's in there.
>> okay.
>> the motion really is to authorize county judge to get with the planning and budget office to draft an appropriate letter request to county managers on behalf of the Commissioners court.
>> second.
>> okay.
>> any more discussion?
>> no.
>> would that include elected officials as well, judge?
>> yeah.
>> you think so?
>> managers and -- [multiple voices]
>> I'm assuming managers would be appointed, elected.
>> the grunts [laughter]
>> uh-huh.
>> any more discussion? All in favor? That passes by unanimous vote.
Last Modified: Wednesday, June 18, 2003 9:52 AM