Travis County Commissioners Court
February 20, 2007
Item 30
>> this resolution under 30. A. Consider and take appropriate action, resolution supporting the restriction of construction of new billboards on state highway 71 in Travis County. Probably ought to pull that up with the rest of the items before taking action. But we can deal with the resolution.
>> good morning.
>> judge, I wanted to -- before we let Margaret and pepper say anything, I would like for joe to give us, you know, quick snapshot of -- of taking us back to what we did to the southwest dialogue plan because the billboard issue was, you know, one of the things that specifically was as a matter of fact one of the few things that I remember as being unanimous with regards to -- to people's feelings, especially in western Travis County. I think that probably is not just western Travis County, but most people in the state probably have a lot, share a lot of these same opinions. Joe, why don't you --
>> we do have a pretty diverse group of stakeholders in that process. It took six months to go through various interests, I think one of the proposals that everyone was in agreement on is in an effort to try to maintain the hill country look of southwest Travis County is to -- to eliminate or actually restrict billboards along the major highways. They want roadways that retain their rural character. And this would certainly help do that.
>> judge, if you wouldn't mind I mean let me read the resolution and then we will let
>> [indiscernible] and pepper say whatever they would like to say. Would that be all right with you?
>> uh-huh.
>> I do appreciate the court's agreement that this is something important to all of us. Really is going help, if nothing else, I mean, at least send a message over to the legislature that we are very supportive, you know, of this. The resolution reads whereas nearly 350 Texas cities have stopped new off premise billboard construction and whereas Travis County has no authority to stop new off premise billboards and whereas the roads in Travis County are a public investment and whereas the roads in Travis County are heavily traveled by tourists and residents who fund the construction, operation and maintenance of the roads and participate in the regional and state economy and whereas as a public investment the roads in Travis County must be protected. Whereas the regional economy is dependent on the preservation of the areas natural beauty and whereas the region's roadways, their scenery are directly related to local and state economy and whereas it is desirable to protect and provide for the general welfare of the travelling public and promote the health, safety, welfare, morals, convenience and enjoyment of the travelling public, whereas it is desirable to protect and encourage economic development through tourism and whereas it is desirable to preserve and promote the natural beauty of the region. Now therefore Travis County hereby adopts this resolution to endorse the following legislative proposal, I think there are a couple of bills that are floating around over there. We have certainly -- we certainly will be supportive of those. Any of them that read a bill that prohibits the construction of new off premise signs along state highway 71 located within Travis County. I probably would say that we -- that at least a November of us would probably be supportive, of not just Travis County, but of the number of roads in central Texas, although I think that we probably are going to have a little more weight whenever we talk about Travis County. So hopefully goes there -- that being signed and entered on the 20th day of February, the 7th, of -- February the 20th, 2007, I move approval.
>>
>> [indiscernible]
>> our consultants will be here.
>> given the fact we will take action on it whenever you all aren't here --
>> comments?
>> good morning. It's nice to be here to say thank you for a change. My name is pepper morris. And on behalf of the lick creek ranch property owners association, of which I am the vice-president, I would like to thank all of you for -- for your supportive efforts in restricting construction of new billboards on highway 71. And I think that -- that all of the tourists who are invited to -- to come our way, especially down highway 71 to see the beautiful flowers and whatnot will thank you, too. Thanks.
>> thank you, pepper.
>> thank you all very much.
>> also for --
>> you know, thank you for your comments and your concern about the billboards. But billboards aren't the only place impact 71 in Travis County. I think it's kind of -- in truth it's been unwelcome in several parts of the county. And I think -- I think it would be -- it would be something that I think that you need to look at, maybe get a good global picture of where -- where you would like, where those billboards are being placed and things like that. I think we really do need to look at a lot of other roadways, new roadways, s.h. 130 the whole nine yards. I think we really need to take a good close peek to ensure that we do not be overwhelmed with intrusive billboards right up under your nose. I hear what you're saying, but I think that it need to be more pervasive than just 71.
>> scenic Texas also advocating for a billboard restrictions along 130 corridor?
>> yes. My name is Margaret
>> [indiscernible] the policy director for scenic Texas. Thank you for that question because let me just give you a little perspective. In the state of Texas, there are approximately 35,000 billboards that are existing on our state -- on our roads. This is a state-wide problem and it's a problem that scenic Texas has been supportive of doing something about for years. Senator jane nelson has filed a bill that will -- it's senate bill 137. She filed the same bill last session. It would actually give the county Commissioners the authority to stop billboard construction on any road that is -- that is within the -- within the county but outside of the -- outside of the city's e.t.j. And the reason that the e.t.j. Is not included is because right now cities have the authority to stop billboard construction in the corporate limits and also in the e.t.j.'s. And so -- so as long as cities are doing, you know, or making those public policy decisions and stopping them, then your problem would only be in those areas that are outside of the e.t.j. I’m not confident that that bill is going to pass. So what's happened is that a lot of citizens like pepper and her group have said, you know, enough is enough. We want to at least protect these roads so they have gone to their own state senators, their own state representatives, said look we need state legislation to stop this construction. That's why you have this chapter 391.252 in the transportation code that starts listing a whole bunch of roads. And actually bandera county last session stopped the construction on all of their roads. They had a bill that stopped on all of the roads, waller county has one filed right now to stop them on all of the roads in waller county. So there are vehicles that you can go directly to the legislature and have some action. We hope that the county -- we are calling it the county option bill. You would have the option to do something. Senate bill 137 passes. If it passes. So any of those bills that you want to support we would encourage you to support.
>> okay.
>> I brought point up, talking about highway 71 west, of course there are things all over the place, very offensive. Of course we have new roads coming in all over the county. Of course I am looking for the vehicles that we can maybe attach ourselves to to prohibit some of the same things. Whatever we need to do to stop that I just think that we need to do it. I guess that I’m going to probably request t.n.r. To look into this, see how to go about this. But as far as local is concerned. Thank you.
>> yes, sir. Margaret, along with senator nelson's bill 137, I understand senator watson also has senate bill 669, house member fulton has house bill 1546. Any other bills that we or the public should look for to advocate for?
>> there are other bills that affect other parts of the state. I have a list in my briefcase I can give you. I can leave with you. But I’m trying to think. In this area, I don't believe so. You mentioned 30. That was protected last session, state representative mike krusee protected 30 the bypass from georgetown down to --
>> s.h. 130.
>> that one is protected.
>> it was added last session. Barrientos did bee cave.
>> 290.
>> okay. Parts of 290.
>> one at bee cave, I think that was a local -- I can't remember the name of it now.
>> we appreciate you all coming down.
>> I will give you the list.
>> be good to have.
>> thank you very much.
>> thank you for your testimony.
>> call this up for action under 30.
>> judge, I just have a brief announcement. I want to welcome the
>> [indiscernible] garza, an intern with my office. Recently graduated from st. Edward's university. So she will be with my office temporarily.
>> all right.
>> ms. Garza, do you want to get on television before the million people watching us?
>> no thank you
>> [laughter]
>> welcome.
Now let's go to the legislative item, you all. We have a lot of bills and draft bills listed today. Now, 30 is to consider and take appropriate action on certain legislative issues and proposed bills before the 80th Texas legislature, including the following. Maybe I ought to read through here and try to pull out a few that are here to accommodate a few schedules, if you all don't mind. The judge is here on i, right? Relating to certain recommended statutory change changes to Texas code of criminal procedure, including articles 16.22, 17 17.032 and subsections of article 46 b. Judge, what is this one about?
>> the first statute that I have suggested that we change is 16.22. It is a companion statute to it, 17.032, both in the code of criminal procedure. These statutes were enacted for the purpose of identifying mentally ill and retarded persons in the jail and expediting their release on bond in appropriate circumstances. The statute is not working very well for a number of reasons across the state of Texas. Probably the primary reason is that it requires treatment. And if loose no treatment, then it's difficult for folks to get out on a bond. But there are several things that I think would benefit the state of Texas as well as Travis County, the first firsten which would be to change some language. The psychiatric examinations are supposed to be conducted either by the local mrmr or a disinterested expert. Disinterested expert has been interpreted to mean not some one at the Travis County jail or at another jail. Disinterested expert does not mention what type of qualifications a person would need to have. I think that the language needs to be changed to a qualified mental health or retardation expert. The reason for that is that it would allow us to utilize the evaluations that are ly being done by our Travis County sheriffs office personal. You have funded recently new positions in that unit. They are doing a fantastic job of redesigning their evaluation system. They are perfectly capable of doing what the statute requires but for the fact that currently their prohibited from doing it by statute. So what we are doing is doing the evaluation twice. Because all jails must evaluate folks coming in with the psychiatric problem because of medication, housing, liability issues and so forth. I think that mrmr is a great organization and in many communities in Texas they are already in the jails. This would not prohibit us from contracting with mrmr if that was appropriate. There are a lot of different ways that we partner with mr mrmr where I think the dollars could be better spent than in duplicating an effort. So that is one of the first changes. The second is that--
>> first change is really to instead of there being two, there would be one.
>> no. Instead of it saying mrmr or disinterested expert, it would say mrmr or a qualified mental health or mental retardation expert.
>> and qualified expert would be, would include our jail personnel plus--
>> there's different statutes that define qualified mental health expert. Generally it's a person with a master's in social work, licensed professional counselor, psychologist, psychiatrist, could be a registered nurse who has a psychiatric background and so forth. We do have those type of positions in our jail program currently.
>> okay. We think the other urban counties in Texas will will look at this language and say this is a good thing ?
>> I think so. And I think some advocacy groups will look and say it's a good thing. Distinted expert doesn't guarantee anybody that the right kind of person is going to do the exam.
>> okay.
>> the other thing is to not require an exam if the person has been examined in the jail within the past year. Right now if some one is re rearrested, we do have people that as you know cycle in and out with mental illness. They don't need to be reevaluated every time. My suggestion is if it's within a year, we can rely on the previous evaluation. There are some other languages in here that I think is appropriate. Currently the reports are not due for 30 days. As you know, most misdemeanors can be disposed of within 30 days. The report itself is very limited. I think it's appropriate that it be a ten-daytime period for misdemeanor cases cases. I changed it to say, it will stay 30 days for felonies and ten days for misdemeanors. Last , the statute as it currently reads prohibits the court or the state from proceeding in court until you have this examination. And that's because they don't want people to be rushed to take a plea without them being identified as meantally ill. I agree with that in general general. However, it also serves f we were to follow the statute, to make people with mental illness stay in jail longer. The truth of the matter is most attorneys when they visit the client that they are retired to visit within just days know if a person needs the have a come pen testy examlve they know if it's a person that has mental illness. I don't want the whole process to be tide up by--ti by--tied up by the statue. What I have done is to change the language so that nothing would prevent the release of a mentally ill or retarded person from jail on a personal surety bond or a court order for competency exam prior to an evaluation. There are plenty of folks that have mental illness that are stable and they should be getting out on personal body right away. Truthfully--bond right a. I think it needs to be clarified that we are not in violation of the state statute when they do get out right away.
>> I’m not sure I understood the last sentence.
>> all right.
>> clarify, okay, right now we don't let them out on personal bond if--
>> no, we do. The way the statute reads, it operates as a stay of criminal proceeding. What I have done is to remove the language to have it operate as a stay, meaning whenever some one is found incompetent, we can't proceed with the case until they are restñrd to competency.
>> right.
>> the way this read, we can't proceed until we get that record--that report. That's just not good. It's not workable. I left the language requiring the report because for example, if an attorney does not recognize the fact that some--that someone has a mental illness or they are incompetent, this operates as a safe catch. An attorney recognizes that up front there should be no reason that we can't order an exam right then and there there. And that is what we do.
>> this just codifies our current practice, does it not ?
>> I think it cot fys the practice of the entire state of Texas.
>> is there a database available somewhere along the line that when, as you stated, there is an attorney or some one may not have knowledge of the person's mental status, is there a database that the made available? On some occasions you have persons that are repeat, persons that come before you you. The question is, is there a database that can be plugged into for these particular persons that are brought before you, as far as identifying and letting them know that this person does have mental capacity reduced reduced?
>> yes, there are records maintained. They have been good about identifying folks. What we do is reappoint the attorneys from the mental health wheel.
>> right.
>> so the sheriffs office does maintain, these are all medical records. The data bait is not something that we can re-- re--database is not something we can release and make available to just anyone.
>> I understand that.
>> yes, we do do that.
>> when I asked whether it codifies current practice, of course just because it codifies current practice doesn't necessarily mean it's good. But is there any opposition to this by the defense bar ?
>> I don't think there, there is no good place to ask the defense bar, okay? But I will tell you that the attorneys working, that are doing the mental health appointment, are not going to object to this.
>> sheet that shows the various--
>> that is with regard to the next issue.
>> okay.
>> well, one more. On 17.032, which is the next thing in the statute, I’m asking that we strike assault from that statute. Let me explain why. These offenses mean that some one cannot get out on personal, a mental health personal bond if they have allegedly committed one of these offenses or have a previous conviction. It also serves as a prohibition to send some one to ash or another state hospital that is not a maximum security. There are many assault case that are very minor. A slap across some one's face that causes pain is an assault. That's a far cry from a very serious assault, say some one to choke some one around the neck. The statute causes a bottleneck in getting people to the state hospitals because there's only one maximum security hospital in Texas, which is north Texas unit at vernon. They have the longest wait is list there, to the extent that this offense, folks with this offense can be committed to another state hospital, we will free up space to get some of these folks charged with these other offenses up to be restorable quickly. And we will also be able to let people out with a minor assault on a mental health bond. Okay? The next series of changes have been long in coming, and I have attached for you an article from the states statesman regarding a lawsuit filed a this particular issue, as well as what we call the writ list which is the excel spreadsheet. Let 3450 explain what the writ list is. This is what our crisis intervention team maintains because they are the folks that have to transport somebody found incompetent to stand trial to a state hospital for rose rose--for restoration. If you look on the first panel, I starred and circled the first individual. His name I’m not going to say because we are on tv. If you will note the writ was received, that mean when they are found incompetent and there's an order committing them, on February 27 of '06. They did not go to ash until April 12 of '06 and they had a resisting arrest and possession of marijuana charge. That means they are sitting in our jail, our taxpayers are paying for them to sit there, on a very minor, in the greater scheme of things offense. That is because of state of Texas has not made enough beds available in the state hospitalsen have not proactively assisted the counties in providing out outpatient restoration treatment. Both of those things would solve this problem. If you will go to the second to the last page, page 4.
>> just for emphasis here, resisting arrest in a possession of marijuana case assuming this person was guilty, would probably bring about a 30-day sentence which might end up being an actual 15 days in jail.
>> that the correct.
>> this person ended up being in jail for a month and a half.
>> right. And of course had to be transported back and then put on the docket. They probably spent even more time than that.
>> so this individual had, what, in all likelihood a far longer sentence than an individual without mental illness would have received.
>> right. Right. I will tell you that, I don't they if you are aware that in the state of florida advocates have been success successful in suing the state and the head of the equivalent of the department of state health services and the state of florida has ended up paying a lot of money because they were violating due process right of defendants. It also happened in other states. And so far the courts have ruled that you may not hold some one for these lengthy periods of time of time waiting for restoration. If you look at page 4, I will tell you that they have improved upon their time. And that's because, I believe, the pressure that was placed upon the department of state health services. But still, just in January we have an individual, couple of individuals I circled with misdemeanor offenses, that took 25 days to reach the state hospital. It's just not acceptable that those lengths of time. I can't tell you exactly how much money this would mean to Travis County, but we can certainly calculate the number of days that people are sitting in jail, waiting to be restored. And it's wrong. It violates their rights. And it's expensive. And it also delays disposition of these cases, and that's not good for prosecution. And so I think that the changes that I’ve made, which require that the department of state health services have a bed available at 72 hours had, would save money, it would be the right thing to do, and it would promote the more rapid disposition of any criminal case.
>> just wondering, that was going to be one of my questions to follow up and ask you, and that was the money saved, that Travis County would realize if this legislation was a statute, was actually changed per your request here. I guess I’m still looking for that amount of money that would save, the taxpayers would realize. What I would like to know, and maybe get pbo or somebody to maybe run the numbers to see exactly, looking at this document, looking at the days as oppos opposed to days spent earlier, there would have to be some quantified savings.
>> sewer.
>> crimcriminal justice planning.
>> whoever that would be, I would specifically request that information. If anybody asks me, Commissioner, you voted blah blah blah, how much would that save me as a taxpayer, I would be able to told them them. All of us would be able to tell them.
>> all right. I’ll make that request.
>> let's run that, those numbers.
>> okay.
>> see what that would save the taxpayers.
>> these folks, if some one is incompetent, they are our most expensive defendants in our jail because some of them have to be housed in what you call slick cells. Most of them are given cycle psycho tropic medication, which we know costs a lot of money.
>> okay.
>> I will find that out. The other thing I have done is try to make some incentive for the department state health services to have outpatient restoration of facilities. There are folks that can be released on bond that are mountainly mountain-- mountain--mentally il that can go into a program where competency can be restored that do not need to be in a lock down facility. One of the concerns that the mental health advocates, mhm mhmr have, about this statute is, we don't want the department of state health services to simply take all the beds that are nonfor ensick, in other words for people that dough not have a criminal case, and turn them into forensic beds, and then you have people that cannot get into the state hospital that have need it very badly. What we really need are more beds and more facilities across the state of Texas. So I added some language, in consultation with a couple of other attorney advocates, that we hope would mean that the department of state health services would make available restoration treatment in the least, and there's a term of art that I have in here, and I’m going to forget, lease restrictive least restrictive environment.
>> what's the request today ?
>> the request today, I have made a couple of changes since I gave the statute to our lobbist to have a look at. The ones that you have are correct. My request is that you allow Travis County to move forward on the statutory changes and advocate to the legislature, because I think that they are in the interest of criminal justice jail di version and mentally ill people.
>> excuse me, do we have a vehicle on which this can be tagged? I understand that we are past the date to submit bills to legislative counsel.
>> Commissioner talian exercised the good judgment when this came to our attention on Friday to just get it turned in and asked that it be drafted, just from a friend. So it is turned in. So we did meet the deadline.
>> good.
>> so we should in theory get this back in time. So we've preserved, I guess, the right or the ability of the court to make that decision.
>> if you want to make the change, let us know what the change is ?
>> I think it will be plenty of time do that. There's a stack sitting on whoever's desk, they will not likely get to that before we can ask them to make a minor change in it. I would further comment, this is a really excellent package from my perspective. Ation court ation--as the court knows, I have expressed the interest many times before the court. I am very happy to see this being brought forward. I will say two things, however. One, this is somewhat complex. These are not things that other people don't comment on. There will likely be with respect to some of the suggestions dialogue, and probably extensive, and disagreement. Nonetheless, I think it's a very positive thing for the court to push stuff like this forwards. It makes a lot of sense to me. There are always other considerations and I’m sure those will be brut out-- out--brought out in due course. I will also tell you court that what the judge is suggesting is very consistent with this very big picture that I think is one of the most important things happening in the legislature this session regarding county, and that is the whole concept of rethinking how we handle the jail populations of clearly there are a number of things that we are doing in state policy today that are just not smart. We have people in jail who shouldn't be in jail. We have treatment options for the mentally ill and for the substance addicted that are less expensiveless expense than having people in jail, and make big sense in the long run. There are a lot of people in the legislature focused on this. There's likely to be substantial progress made on this session. And one of the, to put in it dollar terms, big winners of that smarter approach, I think, will be counties because you essentially are the last place that bears the costs of some of these not smart policies.
>> for those reasons and other I move that Commissioners court approve the recommendation and authorize our consultant to not only get the bill filed but try to get it enacted into law.
>> this is a continuation of what we have been wanting to do.
>> with that, was a concern discussed at the event that I just attended last week. Small counties, doesn't matter, everyone is saying the same thing. As far as what is being discussed today and how counties are going to deal with it, think we are in line to move forward with this. Hopefully, it appears that, I don't know about kfc, it appears they appeared to be supportive from what I can tell. I’m quite sure, Margaret, are they basically on board with this ?
>> yes.
>> it appears that all the counties are in support of this as far as what I can tell.
>> all in favor. That passes by unanimous vote. Thank you, judge judge.
>> thank you very much.
>> if you have a bill or otherwise, come to the front here, give us the number and that way we make sure we get you and get you soon. Tell us what item it is so I can read it. It will officially be before us. Joe, you are here on which one ?
>> howard's bill. You have it listed. G, senate bill 133.
>> resolution supporting bill 133 relating to the appraisal for ad valorum tax purposes, for wildlife management under a conservation easement. Okay.
>> what this is, basically it will recognize the b cp properties as being eligible for this tax deferral. So, and it's beneficial, of course, to Travis County in part because it creates the incentive for landowners to manage their land under the b cp, federal permit for en endangered species, senting aside property for preservation of endangered speese i. Being able to get the same tax break that other wildlife valuations get. That's why we would be supportive of this bill.
>> questions? Move approval.
>> second.
>> and that we signed the prepared resolution.
>> actually there's one for the senate version and one for the house version.
>> all regarding subject matter.
>> that's correct.
>> all in favor. That passes by unanimous vote. Thank you very much. A, which we read this morning, resolution supporting the restriction of construction of new billboards on state highway 71 in Travis County, we have two residents down and discuss you had it in motion motion. All in favor, that passes by unanimous vote. I did get a list of other bills that I will make available first thing this afternoon. Joe, you have another one? What about your land use bill? You trying to avoid that one one?
>> we are making progress. We have met with the state senator and are pulling together, basically getting guidance on what, if anything, we ought to put into the bill. We don't have any specific draft yet but that should be coming fairly soon.
>> have it back on next week.
>> that's fine.
>> judge, excuse me a minute minute. On a that the court just passed, does that require the staff to seek a bill to be drafted ?
>> no, there are a couple of bills in the works.
>> the couple that are already there.
>> right.
>> I have seen those.
>> senate bill 669, house bill 1564, and I understand from today's session, from the citizen's comments, there's also senate bill 137 providing county authority statewide. But of course sb and hb are specific to particular rose in and outside Travis County.
>> thank you.
>> my concern, as I stated earlier, is with the road network, new roads coming on line throughout the county, is that one of these bills address those. I want to make sure that we cover as much as we possible can, of course, Travis County. We have a system of roads and they may be left out and then subject to that situation of unsightly billboards. And of course, definitely, I don't want to see that happen. We have a lot of roads that will be tying into that. I want to be sure they are also a part of this process. If those bills are there, I want to be sure they are inclusive with the roads that have not been constructed but will be going under constructed as we tie and intersect 130.
>> yes, sir.
>> ms. Bacon.
>> this isn't on the specific list so this is just sort of a fyi to sort of lay this out. If you all want to get it on the list for future Tuesdays that's fine. This has had a little bit of conversation in some of the legislative meetings that I attend over at tac and various other things it's house bill 1517, and sort of one of those things where I think the underlying concept, which is sort of a little more visibility in government, is something that we can sort of all agree with, but, you know, as things seem to do, it's a little bit sort of taken a long way here and I think there's some difficulties here for us and soz associated with it--costs associated with it. But basically it's what we would refer to as a legislative consultant because we don't give them the money and things that you traditionally think of a lobbist as having but it's sort of that concept. And the bill does a couple things. First of all, it talks about some additional requirements that if you are, I’ll just use the term lobbist, if you are a lobby it for a governmental entity, that you would have to do with regards to how you report your things to the state, they already have to report. This would just make them report a little more obsessively. And then, but then there's another portion for the county and this is really sort of the sea change on this deal, which is for hired consultant, we would have to keep a list of issues for which we retain the consultant, which obviously we're already doing this in a very public forum here. So it really wouldn't add too much in visibilitilve we would also need to keep a list of the positions that we take on these issues, with you you all basically vote publicly on here. It would be taking something clearly in a public forum but requiring us to put in it a list and maintain it and do some other things, which as we know there are costs associated with that. The real difference is for officers and employees, we would need to calculate expenditures that we make in aid of direct communication with a sledge sleigh tour or basically--legislature or basically legislative staff. They define direct communication as including communications with or without the intent to influence legislature. That would be almost any conversation that you would have. The direct communication concept also includes activities in connection with communication, whatever that means. And finally, once we calculated all this, which would, you know, be, I think a lot of time where we would be keeping time sheets every time we did something that met this incredibly broad definition, we would then be filing that in our financial reports and financial statements, which as we all know, there are formats for financial statements. This doesn't typically meet that. On top of it, nobody reads those anyway. So if they want visibility, that would not be the place to put it. Because of the broad definition, I would see that there would potentially be a lot of additional time keeping requirements that we would have to have. I think that because of the broad definition, it would maybe even include, let's say we had an unsolicited request from our delegation, they wanted information on how a bill my affect us, or some topic in the interim, whatever that is, we would basically need to say to them, we really don't have the resources to track the time it's going to take us to get this to you. I think that it will start shutting down communications to some extent. Theoretically if you had a clat in church with your legislator, you would be booking this time somewhere. It's really very broad and doesn't limit it to the work week or anything else. So I think that there may be some other down sides to it. I think because of the broad definition where you are not even having to influence legislation, in some county if you are maybe hiring a law firm that has a legislature who works for it you might be calculating that time too. I think that the broadness of the definition really lends itself to a very wide discussion of how you're going to have to calculate this time and how much effort you would have to put in.
>> because of this piece of legislation is not on the agenda for today, am I correct ?
>> right.
>> we haven't had the time, the opportunity to review the text. I hear what you are saying. And I’m also mindful that many of the arguments you are making are the exam same arguments that corporate lobbists make about the imposition of their reporting requirements. So--
>> this doesn't change them as much as it changes us. I’m just sort of laying this out so that it's on your radar screen because it does it is a sea change for us. Not so much for them because they already have to report all this stuff. But for any employee. I think what they are trying to get to, in other counties that are individuals who are perhaps hired full time, maybe sort of their primary function to be this liaison. And so I think they are maybe trying to figure out how to capture those costs that may not be quite as obvious as what's being filed on behalf of a contracted. On the other hand, all of this stuff is pretty much available under open records if somebody wants to pick up and call. We get requests for this information.
>> I think our conversation could be more fruitful.
>> oh, yeah, yeah. I’m not asking you to discuss. I’m just laying it out so you all can do with it as you wish.
>> h b 1517.
>> yes.
>> if you would get us a copy of that. If you have your notes reduc reduced to writing there, April, we'll put in it the backup for next week and look at it before Tuesday, okay ?
>> okay.
>> okay. J is senate bill 668 relating to the operation, powers and duties of a toll project entity. That the senator watson's bill, isn't it ?
>> uh-huh.
>> in his view addresses some of the issues that have come up not only here in Travis County but statewide. I looked at it and looks real good to me. Any questions about it ?
>> does j have anything to do with senator watson's bill, have anything to do with toll monies going away after a toll has been, a toll road has been paid for?
>> yes. I mean, didn't I read.
>> --
>> it requires that the metropolitan planning, in 37 37.103, it rivers that the-- the--in 371.103, it requires that the metropolitan planning organization, the r rma cannot move the excess revenue to another project without the mpo's approval.
>> doesn't say dispose. It's not the intention, there, not to stop the toll tolling of a road one it's paid for.
>> the intention is to put the authority to make that decision back with the elected officials who sit as represent I was on the-- the--representatives on the mp f. There's a laundry list of things that go back to elected officials of mpo, including leasing, selling or conveyinging to another entity, contracting with another entity to run it, increasing the toll, refinancing the project, imposing tolls after the bonded indeedness is run down, spending surplus on another project.
>> but effectively taking all that away from the rma and putting it back to the m mpo.
>> essentially giving the mp mpo the veto power over the rma's decision to do any of these items.
>> addresses a lot of the objections that have been raised. Move approval.
>> second.
>> we can let the senator know two is sent to the camp campo members. All in favor. That passes by unanimous vote.
>> just, just a question on that. Do you want a letter on that coming from court that would be addressed to the senator or do you want to authorize us to put in a witness card at the hearing on behalf of the Commissioners court in support of the bill? What would be your reference reference?
>> both.
>> okay.
>> can we do both ?
>> we can.
>> I do think we ought to put just kind of a short letter but one that the whole court signs. Then when the bill comes up for hearing, that you submit one of those.
>> witness cards.
>> okay.
>> do you all have an opinion as to whether or not chairman cruce is feeling about this ?
>> it's less clear. On the senate side where smat--senator watson filed the bill, there have been a number of comments consistent with what is suggested here. My thought is it's very likely that this bill oar these provisions perhaps in another bill have a pretty good chance to pass out of the small--of the senate. I just don't nope the answer on the house side yet. I think loose a slightly different perspective in the house but that is emerging.
>> I think it's consistent where what I see as an overall trend of moving the transportation decisions to local control by elected officials at the local level level. I think it has serious legs.
>> h is senate bill 12 relating to programs for the enhancement of air quality, including energy efficiency initiatives, providing penalties. This really goes to turp, the clean air bill last time the program that Travis County has been part of, and looks like, to me, what the senator is trying to do here is supportive of Travis County efforts and consistent with what we have wished all along. Questions or objections? I don't know that I would be able to answer questions, but joe is here. Move approval.
>> second.
>> discussion ?
>> I had one question.
>> okay.
>> dale might be able to answer for me. In this really detailed bill I believe that page 20, line 15-21, actually, no, I figur figured that out. Sorry. It's fine.
>> all in favor. That passes by unanimous vote.
>> judge, just clarification clarification. By taking that vote do you authorize us to support that bill over at the capital in whatever appropriate way ?
>> whenever we take an affirmative vote, seems if we don't have a resolution, at least we ought to come up with a letter that generally indicate our support for the bill.
>> of course, that the on any bill. But this one in particular, since it is so dense, gets down to microwave energy decisions, if you could help us along with that. I know that with such a dense bill there could be interesting little scunks in the wood pile that get inserted.
>> I did not receive any opposition from anybody. If you check with ms. No e l have her check with the clean air coalition, make sure they are on board, people working on clean air issues. When I looked at it it seemed well consistent with what we have been wishing for for the last couple years.
>> right.
>> they had been working on it for several years.
>> moving up in reverse order, we approved g. On f we're waiting for a specific bill. We will have it back on next week. That's the gasby 45 matter. And e is the Travis County healthcare district board of managers bill. And we'll have that back on next week. What I are do with them, either have somebody here or give us a memo. They met with me and whether they are asking for seemed the make all the sense in the world.
>> I think they are waiting for draft legislation and legislative council. Just fyi, we are meeting with their legislative consultants this afternoon and they are going to give us an overview of what that is.
>> okay. Maybe next week you all can spend a minute or minute and a half, maybe giving us the highlights.
>> there's some specific information that I requested from the hospital folks. Healthcare district folks. And my concern, I just hope they provide me with the information before this comes back. I haven't searched anything yet because I raised a lot of point in our meeting. So if they listen to this, please give me that information before this comes back on next week's agenda. I really would appreciate it it.
>> c, draft bill relating to the claim nal and civil enforcement of the required payment of tolls for the use of certain turnpike projects projects. We got bogged down on this item last week any changes? Still where we were ?
>> judge, we are still where we are. We have a placeholder bill that we have at least given to representative strom and senator watson's office and we said just hold it until the court makes a decision. I know I’ve spoken with Commissioner eckhardt and I’ve spoken with the county attorney, and they do have, and Commissioner, might be best for you to speak on it. There are some different approaches here, some other issues that haven't been raised. Because we did inherit this bill from last session from another member of the legislature and we just took the bill as drafted. Given the special situation in Travis County, the bill may not be right for us, number one. Number two, we may not need legislation. And so, let me, with that, turn it over to Commissioner.
>> my an understanding was that from the county's , , perspective, the intent was to move the load from the jp who would get the brunt of the cases. I don't think this bill actually does that. I think that this bill is really more of a trojan horse for increased tex dot authority at the local level level. We have other opportunities to reduce the caseload both under existing procedures that we may have in the county attorney's office as well as possible venue fixes in legislation that we could tack onto other bills that I’m discussing with a few people. I have discussed this bill with legislator stromnd's office and senator watson's office. Senator watson's office was keenly sensitized to the appearance that this bill really doesn't do what we think it does. And also the county attorney is taking a look at our current hot check procedures to see if we can utilize those procedures as a way to lessen the burden and expedite the process on a straight class c misdemeanor for toll jumping, which is very similar in a lot of ways to hot check.
>> the issue was broughtp by judge zimmer. Somebody needs to check with her. Whatever we think the other solutions are, we need to let her know and get her take on itit.
>> my concern though, and as I try to recall the continuing education things and all the people screaming and hollering about possible unfunded mandate, and of course, just looking at the surface of this bill, it appears that we will be asked to do something under the umbrella of unfunded mandate. And of course, I’m not too much into that. So I just think it needs to be explored. It may not appear to be exactly what it is. But I do know that unfunded mandates is something that I always try to steer clear of as much as possible and let these pay for themselves. Meaning let the money come here if we are going to do something about it. If it's a county attorney shop office and the jp shop, if the toll violators have to go through a process, due process, then it should be, in my opinion, under a structure where that due process is allowed. Of course, then it should be paid for by those proceeds. So that's where I’m kind of coming from, looking at how do we fund unfunded mandate. In this particular situation situation. Thank you.
>> am I hearing that the likely recommendation is for us simply to use available authority ?
>> not necessarily. I think that.
>> just wait until next week week? I can wait.
>> the likelihood is it isn't this bill. There are some legislative fixes that are relatively minor that we might be able to find vehicles for that would alleviate the burden in the jp, particularly jp 2 by essentially spreading the caseload across all of the j jps. That's something that's being looked at as well as--
>> I don't think any of the jp's is going to think that's going to work. I feel a little uneasy accepting this burden without them at least coming out and providing input. Let the county judge take responsibility for touching base with them, inviting them down or asking them to give us something in writing so we will know how to proceed. If they have not looked at the current bill, then we need to get them had a copy. We have a copy in court last week, right? They can look at it. I’m happy to do nothing. If we do nothing, though, and there would be a likely increase in their workload, then I feel a whole lot better with this being on their radar. Having said that, I can wait until next week. There is one other bill on the agenda, before we get to and really need to ask the county attorney one question on this afternoon. That is b, draft bill relating to the collection of a parking fee for maintenance of designated parking facilities. We have a bill drafted. That's a one-pager. But my question is, right, my question, john, is what authority do we have to charge fees currently? Parking fees? The second one, I guess, would be if this is enacted by the legislature, where would we try to impose parking fees? And b of question two is would we do that ourselves or would we do that through vendors that are using our facilities? I have in mind some of the parks and how we contract those out. As far as I know they don't charge parking fees but norm normally they charge some sort of organization participation fee. So I’m trying to figure out how exactly would this work for us. Question two really sort of hinges on our approving it, and one is what do we have currently that's legally deficient that this would address for us. How is that? Now, what to we need to discuss in terms of bills before the legislature that kwee--that we have not discussed today that we can generally discussed but john will tell us we can't take action on?
>> what you are being handed right now is, when you see it, the first page there are four bills, those are bills that you have authorized to be pursued in the legislature. These are bills specific to Travis County. You can see the bill numbers and the status. And then the ten or so pages that follow are bills that we are monitoring. And what we would like to do each week, if you would want to us do this, just to up update this list, this monitor list. It includes comments from your staff as to how the bill would impact Travis County. We will just provide and up update that each week. We can send it to you by e-mail or just bring it to the court on Tuesday morning whatever you would like. But it will be the top sheet will be the primary, first tier bills that we're pursuing for you, and the other ones would be bills of interest that we are monitoring.
>> if we have it on Friday, it would help me to get it on Friday, especially the multipage report.
>> that's no problem.
>> yeah. If you give it to me, you may as well give it to the whole court.
>> we will have it e-mailed to each of you Friday.
>> you can e-mail it ?
>> yes.
>> would Thursday be, a day earlier than Friday? Would that be a problem?
>> I’m sorry? We can get it to you Thursday. Not a problem. We update this daily.
>> I’d prefer to have mine on Thursday. If possible. I take it this will grow as the session continues.
>> yes. And eventually it will dwindle also. We start tryinging it down at some point.
>> okay. Any further? Thank you all very much. Move that we recess until 1: 1:30. All in favor. That passes by unanimous vote.
The Closed Caption log for this Commissioners Court agenda item is provided by Travis County Internet Services. Since this file is derived from the Closed Captions created during live cablecasts, there are occasional spelling and grammatical errors. This Closed Caption log is not an official record the Commissioners Court Meeting and cannot be relied on for official purposes. For official records please contact the County Clerk at (512) 854-4722.
The Closed Caption log for this Commissioners Court agenda item is provided by Travis County Internet Services. Since this file is derived from the Closed Captions created during live cablecasts, there are occasional spelling and grammatical errors. This Closed Caption log is not an official record the Commissioners Court Meeting and cannot be relied on for official purposes. For official records please contact the County Clerk at (512) 854-4722.
Last Modified:
Wednesday, February 21, 2007 2:08 PM