Texas Senate
Subject: Protecting Rights Under the Constitution, Senate Bill 242 (SB 242)
- Author: State Sen. Mayes Middleton (R-Galveston)
- TFR Position: Support
- Background: SB 242 seeks to require the Texas Attorney General to produce a monthly report to the governor, lt. governor, speaker, and lawmakers covering any executive order or federal agency rule that relates to various issue areas and/or violates rights under the U.S. Constitution. SB 242 also prohibits state agencies and local government jurisdictions from cooperating with federal agencies seeking to implement any of the rules deemed unconstitutional by the report. This would ensure that the rights of Texans are protected, which is an appropriate role of government. For this reason, TFR supports SB 242.
Subject: Pro-Taxpayer, Senate Bill 369 (SB 369)
- Author: State Sen. Donna Campbell (R-New Braunfels)
- TFR Position: Support
- Background: SB 369 seeks to automatically disannex certain areas that are paying city property taxes without receiving full city services. SB 369 seeks to enforce existing law and protect residents who are unfairly taxed and establishes a deadline for those cities to be in compliance otherwise allowing the property owner to bring action against the city. Taxpayers should expect that the tax dollars they spend are used for the purposes by which the tax is levied. For this reason, TFR supports SB 369.
Subject: Creation of a Grant Program, Senate Bill 462 (SB 462)
- Author: State Sen. Tan Parker (R-Flower Mound)
- TFR Position: Oppose
- Background: SB 462 seeks to create the Texas Competency-Based Education Grant Program to “fill the gap” between federal funds and the total tuition needs of learners in Competency-based education degree programs. SB 462 has a negative fiscal note of $2.7 million through the biennium and an increasing negative fiscal note every year thereafter. This is not the proper role of government. For this reason, TFR opposes SB 462.
Subject: Ensuring Optimal Choice in Government School System, Senate Bill 472 (SB 472)
- Author: State Sen. Bryan Hughes (R-Mineola)
- TFR Position: Support
- Background: SB 472 seeks to ensure that open-enrollment charter schools are treated in the same manner as independent school districts with regard to zoning, permitting, code compliance, and other local ordinances. Many urban jurisdictions are leveraging ordinances to increase the costs of open-enrollment charter schools and hindering their mission, to the benefit of independent school districts, even though statute ensures that open-enrollment charter schools are in fact a part of the public school system in the state. TFR supports ensuring that existing choice in the government school system remains optimal. For this reason, TFR supports SB 472.
Subject: Itemized Billing for Medical Services, Senate Bill 490 (SB 490)
- Author: State Sen. Bryan Hughes (R-Mineola)
- TFR Position: Support
- Background: SB 490 requires that a medical provider send an itemized bill prior to attempting to collect any money from a patient. The itemized list would include each medical service provided, the amount the provider will accept as payment in full for that service, and a plain language description of the service. For too long, the established healthcare system has benefitted from a protected market marred with government intrusion. Requiring transparency would only increase competition among healthcare providers leading to lower costs and a much more improved system. For these reasons, TFR supports SB 490.
Subject: Prohibition on Tax Dollars Studying Sexual Behavior of Children, Senate Bill 1031 (SB 1031)
- Author: State Sen. Bob Hall (R-Edgewood)
- TFR Position: Support
- Background: SB 1031 seeks to prevent tax dollars from being used to study the sexual behavior of children as young as 13 years of age. The state has relatively no place in the sexual lives of children, except for possibly teaching biological realities of procreation. The state should not study or teach preferences, kinks, or degeneracy. This is the job of parents and we certainly should not be using tax dollars to fund these studies. For this reason, TFR supports SB 1031.
Subject: Burdensome Regulation, Senate Bill 1639 (SB 1639)
- Author: State Sen. Judith Zaffirini (D-Laredo)
- TFR Position: Oppose
- Background: SB 1639 seeks to prohibit the use of any method, technology, device, or software that bypasses ticketing purchasing processes to purchase a number of event tickets that exceed the maximum number of tickets allowed per legitimate buyer. It specifically also addresses bots and establishes civil penalties for a person who creates or uses a bot for the aforementioned purposes. Detecting bots could prove to be very difficult and could pose privacy threats to citizens. In a society that is quickly moving toward AI automation, banning such innovation would be harmful to the progress of this technology and to the free market as a whole. For this reason, TFR opposes SB 1639.
Subject: Socialized Healthcare Program for Texas Students, Senate Bill 1966 (SB 1966)
- Author: State Sen. Carol Alvarado (D-Houston)
- TFR Position: Oppose
- Background: SB 1966 seeks to create a socialized healthcare program for Texas students. The program is modeled after the California Health Alliance and claims to increase school attendance. The reality is that the more government gets involved in healthcare the worse and more inefficient it becomes. Texas should not be wasting tax dollars on socialized healthcare, but deregulating and trusting free enterprise. For these reasons, TFR opposes SB 1966.
Subject: Election Integrity, Senate Bill 1993 (SB 1993)
- Author: State Sen. Mayes Middleton (R-Galveston)
- TFR Position: Support
- Background: SB 1993 seeks to establish that in the event that two percent or more polling locations in a county of one million or more are denied paper ballots for more than one hour then the Secretary of State calls a new election for that county. After the last few years of election discrepancies, there have been a number of measures suggested to tighten election integrity in Texas. SB 1993 seeks to further secure elections in Texas. For this reason, TFR supports SB 1993.
Subject: Pro-Taxpayer, Senate Bill 2038 (SB 2038)
- Author: State Sen. Paul Bettencourt (R-Houston)
- TFR Position: Support
- Background: SB 2038 seeks to allow residents and property owners in an extraterritorial jurisdiction (ETJ) to use petition and election procedures to remove themselves from the ETJ, similar to municipal annexations. For this reason, TFR supports SB 2038.
Subject: Corporate Welfare, Senate Bill 2325 (SB 2325)
- Author: State Sen. Judith Zaffirini (D-Laredo)
- TFR Position: Oppose
- Background: SB 2325 seeks to change the name of “Formula One automobile race” to “The Formula One United States Grand Prix” to ensure that Circuit of the Americas (COTA) is eligible to receive funding from the major events reimbursement program. Government should not be in the business of stealing from taxpayers to give corporate welfare in the form of reimbursement for major events. This practice is antithetical to free enterprise and TFR opposes all subsidies and corporate welfare. For this reason, TFR opposes SB 2325.
Subject: Full Work Week for Government Schools, Senate Bill 2368 (SB 2368)
- Author: State Sen. Donna Campbell (R-New Braunfels)
- TFR Position: Support
- Background: SB 2368 seeks to require that government schools have 5-day work weeks. The introduction of 4-day work weeks has hurt parents when it comes to scheduling and has allowed our unaccountable government school system to work even less in many areas. If public education needs more money for teachers to provide for retention, they should look to much of the bloated administrative salaries, golf courses, and private planes, and instead dedicate that money to the classroom. Education is not underfunded in Texas, it is overfunded. Our parents should not have to suffer, to make bureaucrat lives easier. For this reason, TFR supports SB 2368
Texas House of Representatives
Subject: Giving El Paso County Ability to Issue Certain Bonds, House Joint Resolution 79 (HJR 79)
- Author: State Rep. Joe Moody (D-El Paso)
- TFR Position: Oppose
- Background: HJR 79 seeks to add conservation and reclamation districts in El Paso County to the list of districts that are able to issue bonds backed by property taxes to fund development and maintenance for the purposes of parks and recreation facilities. Though other counties have this ability already, local government jurisdictions have run amok with bonded debt, contributing to the ever-increasing property tax burden on Texas taxpayers. For this reason, TFR opposes HJR 79.
Subject: Growing Government, House Bill 3447 (HB 3447)
- Author: State Rep. Greg Bonnen (R-Friendswood)
- TFR Position: Oppose
- Background: HB 3447 seeks to create the Texas Space Commission and the Texas Aerospace Research and Space Economy Consortium, which will purportedly provide strategic direction for the state’s space and aerospace investments. With a negative fiscal note of nearly $4 million through the biennium and nearly $2m every year thereafter, this is a waste of taxpayer money. There is no need for government intervention when there are multiple private companies like SPACE X and Virgin Galactic doing a much better job in the private sector. In a year when homeowners are being crushed by an ever-increasing property tax burden, we should not be growing government in this manner. For this reason, TFR opposes HB 3447.
Subject: Corporate Welfare, House Bill 2466 (HB 2466)
- Author: State Rep. Angie Chen Button (R-Garland)
- TFR Position: Oppose
- Background: HB 2466 seeks to create the Texas Technology and Innovation Program and the Texas Technology and Innovation Fund. HB 2466 would effectively grow the government and create additional corporate welfare by the establishment of matching government grants. The government picking winners and losers is anti-free enterprise and stifles true competition. Texas should be eliminating corporate welfare and regulation, not creating more. For this reason, TFR opposes HB 2466.
Subject: Pro-Taxpayer, House Bill 159 (HB 159)
- Author: State Rep. Brooks Landgraf (R-Odessa)
- TFR Position: Support
- Background: HB 159 seeks to require that in certain areas of Texas, the same information currently required to be posted online regarding a taxing unit’s no-new-revenue rate and voter-approval property tax rate also be published in a newspaper. This requirement provides additional transparency to Texas taxpayers. For this reason, TFR supports HB 159.
Subject: Benefitting Lawmakers at Expense of Taxpayers, House Bill 438 (HB 438)
- Author: State Rep. Mike Schofield (R-Katy)
- TFR Position: Oppose
- Background: HB 438 seeks to raise the salary for district judges, which also happens to be what the pensions for state lawmakers are tied to. HB 438 represents nothing more than lawmakers attempting to give themselves a more robust retirement package at the expense of Texas taxpayers. In a year when lawmakers refuse to provide tangible property tax relief for taxpayers, they are happy to adjust benefits for themselves. For this reason, TFR opposes HB 438.
Subject: Anti-Taxpayer, House Bill 1755 (HB 1755)
- Author: State Rep. Angie Chen Button (R-Garland)
- TFR Position: Oppose
- Background: HB 1755 seeks to establish the Lone Star Workforce Future Fund. HB 1755 would effectively grow the government and ultimately it should not be involved in “incentivizing” jobs. The only thing that is needed for a successful job market is for the government to get out of the way and let the market decide. For this reason, TFR opposes HB 1755.
Subject: Giving More Taxpayer Money to Higher Education, House Bill 2871 (HB 2871)
- Author: State Rep. Mary González (D-San Elizario)
- TFR Position: Oppose
- Background: HB 2871 seeks to require that The University of Texas at Austin design, develop, and implement a program to support and streamline computer science education and professional development for educators to ultimately attempt to encourage more Texas students to enroll in such courses while also seeking jobs in the technology industry. HB 2871 has a negative fiscal note of $5 million through the biennium and an additional $2.5 million every year thereafter. Both UT-Austin and other universities already have bloated budgets and should do this out of existing resources. Universities push woke ideology and have continued to spend wastefully, ultimately raising tuition costs for students. We should be cutting funding to universities and force them to reduce waste and spending, not throwing more money at them. For this reason, TFR opposes HB 2871
Reminder: Vote Notices are provided to both Texas state lawmakers and the general public in advance of Texans for Fiscal Responsibility’s position on issues to be rated as part of the Fiscal Responsibility Index prior to votes being taken in each legislative chamber.
Disclaimer: We reserve the right to consider amendments to legislation that may be introduced without notice as a part of issues to be rated as part of the Fiscal Responsibility Index. We will make every effort to provide notice on amendments that are pre-filed.
