HBA- ALS H.B. 447 76(R)    BILL ANALYSIS


Office of House Bill AnalysisH.B. 447
By: Reyna, Arthur
State Affairs
2/10/1999
Introduced



BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE 

Currently, there is no community service leave afforded to state employees.
This requires many state employees to donate their time to community
service on weekends or to use accrued annual leave. H.B. 447 authorizes a
state employee to use up to eight hours per year for community service in
addition to vacation and sick leave.  This bill also requires the state
agency to compensate the employee at the same rate the employee receives at
work; prohibits the agency from determining the type of community service;
and requires the employee to provide reasonable notice and submit specified
documentation to the agency upon return to work. 

RULEMAKING AUTHORITY

It is the opinion of the Office of House Bill Analysis that this bill does
not expressly delegate any additional rulemaking authority to a state
officer, department, agency, or institution. 

SECTION BY SECTION ANALYSIS

SECTION 1.   Amends Subchapter F, Chapter 661, Government Code, by adding
Section 661.152, as follows: 

Sec. 661.152.  COMMUNITY SERVICE LEAVE.  (a)  Defines "community service,"
"employee," and "state agency." 

(b)  Authorizes an employee to use eight hours of leave each calendar year
to perform community service during the employee's work schedule. Prohibits
a state agency from determining the type of community service performed by
the employee. 

(c)  Provides that an employee is compensated at the same rate for hours of
community service leave as the employee receives for work.  

(d)  Requires an employee who intends to take community service leave to
give reasonable notice of this intention. 

(e)  Requires an employee to submit to the state agency, upon return to
work, a form provided by the state agency containing the date, hours
performed, a description of the community service, and the signature and
telephone number of the person who supervised or organized the community
service. 

(f)  Prohibits an employee who does not take all community service leave by
the calendar year's last work day from carrying the leave into a future
year or from receiving additional compensation for the leave not taken. 

(g)  Provides that community service leave is in addition to vacation and
sick leave. 

SECTION 2.  Effective date:  January 1, 2000.

SECTION 3.  Emergency clause.