Summer school started at the Texas Capitol—lawmakers could not stay away and kept coming back for different interim hearings. The Judicial Council was given a summer assignment that requires collecting information from prosecutors, and we here at TDCAA have been working with them to keep it from turning into a doctoral dissertation for prosecutors. Let’s check in on the summer vibes at the Texas Legislature!
OCA Data Reporting
The Texas Legislature passed HB 16 during the 89th Second Called Session, which amended Chapter 71 of the Government Code. The changes require that prosecutor offices submit reports to the Judicial Council that include categories of criminal offenses prosecuted, staffing levels, whether the current staffing level is sufficient to support the prosecutor caseload, the number of times a defendant was released as provided by Code of Criminal Procedure Art. 17.151, and the number of electronic notices submitted by the prosecuting attorney to a court (as required by the Code of Criminal Procedure Art. 17.027 (a) (2)). The Judicial Council’s Data Committee met with prosecutors and interested parties to better understand what data would be most useful to understand the challenges that prosecutors face on a daily basis and to gather recommendations on the proposed Prosecutor Reporting Rule. This rule will define how prosecutors will report this information. The Judicial Council plans to have the Prosecutor Reporting Rule published in the July 10 edition of the Texas Register, which will trigger the 30-day comment period, with a final adoption occurring after that period. Anyone (including prosecutors) may comment on the Prosecutor Reporting Rule, and the Council could change the final Prosecutor Reporting Rule based on the public feedback. We will send out a notice once the rule is posted in the Texas Register.
Interim Hearings
The House Select Committee on Governmental Oversight met on June 4 to discuss the interim charge regarding the Texas Regulatory Consistency Act (often referred to as the “Death Star bill”). HB 2127 was passed in 2023 to bar cities and counties from passing or enforcing local ordinances that go further than or conflict with state law. It also gives private citizens the right to sue local governments over non-compliant ordinances. During the first part of the hearing, the charge called for reviewing local ordinances that have been repealed or modified since the act’s effective date, identifying ordinances that conflict with the act, examining lawsuits brought to enforce preemption, and suggesting ways to reduce regulatory inconsistency for small businesses. Committee members questioned witnesses about how to ensure that local municipalities were enforcing state law. Committee members discussed different enforcement measures, including an audit of all ordinances, empowering the Attorney General to enforce compliance, and withholding funds from noncompliant local governments.
For our civil folks, the second half of the hearing focused on governmental and sovereign immunity. Committee members focused on the six-month notice requirement found in §101.101 of the Texas Tort Claims Act (TTCA). A claimant must give a governmental unit formal notice of a claim within six months of the incident, or they are barred from suing. Some lawmakers were concerned that strict bar applies to injuries to minors and applies even if the injury was inherently undiscoverable within that timeframe. These are the types of observations that start the conversation for future bills in the upcoming legislative session. Representative Mitch Little (R-Lewisville) described his frustrations with the current state of the TTCA and with local governments being able to circumvent lawsuits from plaintiffs. Click here for a three-minute video that provides a likely preview of future legislation.
The House Committee on Natural Resources met on June 23. The meeting lasted several hours as the committee focused on the water use and sustainability challenges posed by the rapid expansion of data centers. Members of the Texas Water Development Board (TWDB) testified that they sent out water use surveys to 341 operating data centers for the year 2025 but had only received a 17-percent response rate. Representative David Spiller (R-Jacksboro) brought up criminal prosecution as a potential tool to put some teeth into the rules and compel the remaining 83 percent of data centers to disclose their water usage. (Those remarks can be viewed here.) He references §16.012(m) of the Texas Water Code, noting that the law allows for a criminal charge against entities that fail to timely complete and return their water use surveys. Data centers and their water usage will be a hot topic in the upcoming session, and we will keep our eyes out for any proposed bills that bring local prosecutors into the discussion.
The House Committee on Intergovernmental Affairs met on June 24 to discuss interim charges related to homelessness, mental health, criminal justice system recidivism, and agency oversight. In this three-minute clip, Representative Carl Tepper’s (R-Lubbock) questioning of Austin Police Chief Lisa Davis shows the frustration that lawmakers have with the current homeless situations in cities across Texas. Witnesses also testified about the lack of beds in state hospitals that keep prosecutors from moving cases as they wait for defendants to be restored to competency. Bills concerning the homeless population will certainly be introduced in the upcoming legislative session, and we will keep watch on how they affect prosecutors.
The Senate State Affairs Committee met on June 23 to discuss the regulation of proxy advisory firms and the integrity of elections in Texas. On election security, Jennifer Doinoff, the Hays County Election Administrator and Legislative Chair for the Texas Association of County Election Officials (TACEO), highlighted the severe threats facing election staff and recommended expanding laws to protect their personal safety (video of her testimony is linked here). At this point, there was no direct mention of expanding prosecutors’ duties on either subject, but there is still plenty of time for that to change.
New Federal Grant Rules
The Office of Management and Budget (OMB) has proposed a sweeping rewrite of federal grant rules – and the comment deadline is July 13. The proposed rewrite of the Uniform Guidance (2 CFR Part 200) would affect every county that receives, administers, and passes through federal grant funding. The good people at TAC and their national counterparts at NaCo have more information about this online. If you would like to learn more before you comment or otherwise weigh in on the proposed federal changes to the grant rules, then please go this site.
New Case Summaries Release Day
Beginning in July, TDCAA’s Weekly Case Summaries will be released each Monday, rather than on Friday. The next edition will be released on July 6. If you don’t already receive our case summaries, you can sign up here.
Quotes
“It’s a cumbersome tool that basically is ineffectual. We just want to make sure that we add more tools to the toolkit to make sure that there is accountability for DAs across the entire state of Texas.”
—Governor Greg Abbott, describing the Rogue Prosecutor bill (HB 17) passed in 2023 that allows courts to remove district attorneys for misconduct if they decline to pursue certain types of crimes.
“Disappointing to see so many Republican AGs rush to defend liberal, digital ID style legislation in Texas that was supported by almost every Democrat in the legislature, including James Talarico. SB 2420 grows government, takes options away from parents, and opens the door to surveillance, data abuse, censorship, and [Chinese Communist Party]-style social credit scores.”
—Brian Harrison (R–Midlothian), one of the House members who voted against SB 2420, the App Store Accountability Act, which requires age verification of consumers and parental consent for minors to download apps. The law is being challenged in federal court.
“Placing monitoring equipment in every vehicle and collecting data on every American driver is not a safety measure. It hands other third parties a backdoor into the daily lives of law-abiding citizens who never consented to being watched. The Constitution does not bend just because the technology exists to make surveillance more convenient.”
—Congressman Michael Cloud (R–TX,) explaining why he offered an amendment to the Appropriations Bill that would prohibit the use of FY 2027 appropriated funds to implement the impaired driving technology mandate. The “kill switch” technology for automobiles was mandated in 2021 under the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA), a bipartisan law passed during the Biden administration. (For more context on this public safety law that is supported by MADD, see this Snopes article from earlier this year.)