HBA-CMT H.B. 3181 77(R)    BILL ANALYSIS


Office of House Bill AnalysisH.B. 3181
By: Danburg
Elections
3/19/2001
Introduced



BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE 

Currently, the institutional division of the Texas Department of Criminal
Justice is required to prepare an abstract of felony convictions of
person's 18 years of age or older each month, and deliver that abstract to
the person's county registrar.  The registrar of the county is required to
deliver to the secretary of state, on or after the first day but before the
16th day of January, March, June, September, and December of each year a
list containing each new registration, canceled registration, and change in
registration information that has occurred in the county since the delivery
of the previous list.  This current procedure can be slow and may not allow
for the master record with the secretary of state to be as up to date as it
could be.  House Bill 3181 provides for improvement of the current
procedures for maintaining the voter registration master rolls in the
state.   

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. 

ANALYSIS

House Bill 3181 amends the Election Code to require the Department of
Public Safety (DPS) to prepare each week rather than each month an abstract
of each final judgement convicting a person who is 18 years of age or older
and a resident of this state of a felony, and to file each abstract with
the secretary of state (secretary) no later than one week following the
week in which the abstract is prepared.  The secretary is required to file
each received abstract with the voter registrar of the person's county of
residence no later than one week following the week in which the abstract
was received.   

Once each week, each county registrar is required to deliver to the
secretary of state a list containing each new registration, canceled
registration, and change of registration information that has occurred in
the county since the delivery of the previous list if that county registrar
has not contracted with the secretary for electronic registration data
services.  The secretary is required to use the information to identify any
voters in the master file that may be duplicated, deceased, or ineligible
because of a felony conviction.  The secretary is required to notify the
registrar of the appropriate county of any voter included in the master
file that may be duplicated, deceased, or ineligible because of a felony
conviction.  The bill requires the secretary to prescribe procedures as
necessary to implement these  provisions.   

The bill authorizes state funds to be disbursed for the financing of voter
registration only to defray expenses of the registrar's office in
connection with voter registration, including additional expenses related
to complying with the weekly updating requirements. 

H.B. 3181 requires that once each week, DPS is to electronically transfer
to the secretary the name of each person who completes a voter registration
application submitted to DPS.  The secretary is required to prescribe
procedures to implement the electronic transfer.  The secretary is also
required to inform the appropriate voter registrar of the name of each
person who completes a voter registration application submitted to DPS no
later than the seventh day after the secretary receives the information.
The registrar  is authorized to verify that the registrar has received each
application as indicated by the information provided by the secretary.    

EFFECTIVE DATE

January 1, 2002.