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5 Document(s) [ Subject: Houston%2C%20Texas ]

Committee:	Senate Jurisprudence
Title:	Interim Report
Library Catalog Title:	Senate Committee on Jurisprudence interim report
Subjects:	Adoption | Air pollution control technology | Child abuse | Child custody | Children's Advocacy Centers | Extraterritorial jurisdiction | Grandparents | Houston, Texas | Judges | Juries | Medical records | Occupational licenses | Parents | Private investigators | Probate courts | Records management | Rules of evidence | Texas Code of Criminal Procedure | Visitation rights |
Library Call Number:	L1836.80 J979
Session:	80th R.S. (2007)
Online version:	View report [161 pages  File size: 5,386 kb]
Charges:	This report should address the charges below.
1.	Study the laws governing suits affecting the parent-child relationship involving non-parents, including suits for possession of or access to a child by a grandparent, and make recommendations for providing the best care and protection for the children involved. Provide an assessment of the constitutional issues involved with these suits.
2.	Study the management and storage of adoption records, including the costs and benefits of converting records into digital format. Study ways to increase access by adopted persons and their children and spouses to important family medical history information and ensure that medical history information is updated, while maintaining privacy and anonymity of records.
3.	Examine the role of heir finders in Texas and make recommendations regarding professional standards and fees for heir finders.
4.	Identify and study best practices for representation of children in child abuse and neglect cases and determine whether to implement further training, oversight, or other requirements for judges, attorneys, and others responsible for child abuse and neglect cases, including child sexual abuse cases. Develop and implement tools for children’s advocacy centers (CACs) and prosecutors to successfully investigate and prosecute child abusers. Include the following: Explore changes to the rules of evidence that could facilitate the presentation of child testimony in court; Explore making prior extraneous sex offenses admissible during determination of guilt, as has been adopted in the federal court system; and Explore possible expansion of the rules regarding how cases are consolidated and punishments are stacked in a single trial involving a crime committed against a child.
5.	Study practices intended to enhance the jury experience and increase jury participation, including: allowing jurors to ask questions of witnesses by submitting them to the judge in writing; allowing lawyers to periodically summarize testimony for the jury; allowing jurors to take notes during trial; and allowing jurors to discuss evidence among themselves during trial.
6.	Study and make recommendations relating to the jurisdiction, authority, power and discretion of probate judges in Texas, including the authority of a probate judge to intervene in a non-probate case.
7.	Study administrative and legal procedures used by municipalities to exert regulatory authority beyond city limits and extraterritorial jurisdiction. Determine whether conflicts exist with agencies' regulatory authority and regulatory authority delegated to home-rule municipalities, and make recommendations for appropriate delegation and clarification of respective authorities.
8.	Monitor the implementation of legislation addressed by the Jurisprudence Committee, 80th R.S., and make recommendations for any legislation needed to improve, enhance, and/or complete implementation.
Committee:	House Urban Affairs
Title:	Interim Report
Subjects:	Affordable housing | Crime laboratories | Deed restrictions | Housing and Community Affairs, Texas Department of | Houston Municipal Employees Pension System | Houston Police Department | Houston, Texas | Property tax exemptions | Public retirement systems | Senior citizens | Tax appraisals |
Library Call Number:	L1836.80 UR1
Session:	80th R.S. (2007)
Online version:	View report [37 pages  File size: 3,305 kb]
Charges:	This report should address the charges below.
1.	Asses the current senior housing market and available options for affordable senior housing.
2.	Research and update legislation that permits residential neighborhoods whose deed restrictions have lapsed to reinstate those deed restrictions or create needed deed restrictions through a petition committee by expanding them to more areas.
3.	Study and evaluate the levels, methods and alternatives by which the state funds all affordable housing programs, focusing on administrative cost-effectiveness to determine greater returns on investment, savings and efficiency. Examine the current procedures and applications of the annual, integrated Low Income Housing Plan prepared by the Texas Department of Housing and Community Affairs, and prepare recommendations for the development of a comprehensive, long-range, statewide plan or model to address growing need throughout the state.
4.	Monitor current methodology involving departmental rules, procedures and policies governing state and federal compliance in the evaluation and ranking of all multifamily affordable housing applications for the allocation of funds during the annual awards cycle.
5.	Examine the development and implementation of a physical standards (asset oversight) rating system for multifamily residential rental facilities, to be used by all local and state issuers of tax-exempt bonds and tax credits, to determine eligibility for future financing and for compliance enforcement purposes.
6.	Examine the policies and procedures by which local tax appraisers value rent-restricted affordable housing properties, and authorize legislatively established tax exemptions. Evaluate application and interpretation of existing statutes by local appraisal districts to affordable housing properties throughout the life cycle of developments. Make recommendations for statutory changes. (Joint Interim Charge with the House Committee on Local Government Ways and Means.)
7.	Examine the operation of the Houston Municipal Employees Pension System, its Board of Trustees and staff. (Joint Interim Charge with the House Committee on Pensions and Investments.)
8.	Monitor the report issued by the Independent Investigator for the Houston Police Department Crime Laboratory and Property Room, the independent panel review of certain criminal convictions prompted by the conclusions of this report, and the implementation by the City of Houston of any reforms recommended in this report. Also monitor other urban crime laboratories and their compliance with state laws regulating their functions. (Joint Interim Charge with the House Committee on Law Enforcement.)
Committee:	House Urban Affairs
Title:	Interim Report
Library Catalog Title:	House Committee on Urban Affairs, Texas House of Representatives interim report, 2006 : a report to the House of Representatives, 80th Texas Legislature
Subjects:	Affordable housing | Food safety | Foreclosures | Homeownership | Housing and Community Affairs, Texas Department of | Houston, Texas | Low Income Housing Tax Credit program | Mobile food vendors | Mortgages | Private activity bonds | Rural issues | Subprime lending | Substandard housing |
Library Call Number:	L1836.79 Ur1
Session:	79th R.S. (2005)
Online version:	View report [70 pages  File size: 12,788 kb]
Charges:	This report should address the charges below.
1.	Evaluate the alternative approaches and implications of short-term restrictions on new construction in Houston, Dallas-Fort Worth and Austin for the Texas Department of Housing and Community Affairs 4 percent tax credit-private activity bond program as well as its 9 percent tax credit program.
2.	Consider the implications of eliminating the lottery system for allocating 4 percent housing tax credit awards through the state's Private Activity Bond Program and replacing it with an alternative allocation system.
3.	Examine the home ownership rate for low-income Texans, and recommend suggestions on how home ownership rates can be improved for underserved populations.
4.	Compare and contrast Texas Department of Housing and Community Affairs administration of the Housing Tax Credit program with best practices around the country.
5.	Review the manner and procedures for the determination by the Texas Department of Housing and Community Affairs of the annual Low Income Housing Tax Credits statewide including the 4 percent and 9 percent housing tax credit programs.
6.	Evaluate the effectiveness of current underwriting methods of Texas Department of Housing and Community Affairs for its programs.
7.	Examine municipal regulation of mobile food vending vehicles.
8.	Monitor the agencies and programs under the committee's jurisdiction.
Committee:	House Liquor Regulation
Title:	Interim report
Library Catalog Title:	To the speaker and members of the Texas House of Representatives, Seventy second Legislature : report of the Committee on Liquor Regulation, Texas House of Representatives, Seventy first Legislature.
Subjects:	Alcohol laws and regulations | Alcoholic Beverage Commission, Texas | Bingo | Houston, Texas | Military bases | Supreme Court arguments and decisions, U.S. | Zoning |
Library Call Number:	L1836.71 l669
Session:	71st R.S. (1989)
Online version:	View report [59 pages  File size: 3,598 kb]
Charges:	This report should address the charges below.
1.	To monitor all activities and to have budget oversight responsibilities for those agencies, boards and commissions as listed in Rule 3, Section 22.
2.	To study the feasibility of requiring military installations to purchase liquor from state distributors, in light of the recent US Supreme Court decision to hear arguments in this case.
3.	To study the transition of bingo regulation administration to the Alcoholic Beverage Commission.
4.	To study the problems of cantinas and pubs in areas without zoning laws and what impact they have on neighborhoods.
Committee:	Senate Natural Resources
Title:	Interim Report
Library Catalog Title:	Interim report to the 70th Legislature / Senate Committee on Natural Resources.
Subjects:	Alternative energy | Colonias | Drinking water | Gambling | Groundwater | Hazardous waste | Horse racing | Houston, Texas | Natural gas | Natural gas industry | Oil industry | Solid waste disposal | Texas Panhandle | Wastewater management | Water supplies |
Library Call Number:	L1836.69 n219s
Session:	69th R.S. (1985)
Online version:	View report [152 pages  File size: 4,482 kb]
Charges:	This report should address the charges below.
1.	Study the problems associated with inadequate water and wastewater systems in colonias. Examine some of the resources and funds outside the Water Development Board that could be used to improve water and sewer service in the colonias. *
2.	Study issues associated with water supplies in Houston, including groundwater availability, subsistence, flooding, urban runoff and non-point source water pollution. *
3.	Study groundwater use, quality and protection in the El Paso area. *
4.	Review alternatives to landfills and injection wells for the disposal of hazardous wastes. Consider methods to treat or destroy hazardous wastes, as well as efforts to reduce waste production.
5.	Review the history of horse racing in Texas; consider the possible economic and social costs and benefits of pari-mutuel betting on horse races. Study the predicted effects of legalizing pari-mutuel betting the Texas farm economy. *
6.	Review development of alternative energy sources and renewable energy sources; consider methods to encourage the development of renewable energy sources in Texas.
7.	Hold public hearings on issues related to the production of white oil (chilled, condensed natural gas) in the Texas Panhandle. Consider the effects of the Railroad Commission's ruling on white oil on the oil and gas industry and the economy of the Texas Panhandle. Review federal court actions related to the dispute.

* This represents an abstract of the report contents. Charge text is incomplete or unavailable.

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