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The great two-thirds rule debate has begun

Sen. John Whitmire, the dean of the Texas Senate (2008 AP Photo/Harry Cabluck)

Update at 4:00 p.m.: Checked tape, made minor changes to Whitmire’s and Nelson’s quotes.

Original item at 11:29 a.m.: The Texas Senate has begun its expected debate over whether to abandon a rule that for many decades has protected partisan, geographic and racial-ethnic minorities.

At a briefing on taxes for new Senate budget writers Wednesday, the chamber’s longest-serving member, Houston Democrat John Whitmire, launched a wry if somewhat backhanded defense of the “two-thirds rule.”

It can protect from attack things highly valued by rural senators, such as an exemption of agricultural equipment from the sales tax, Whitmire said at a hearing of the Senate Finance Committee.

The rule requires two-thirds of senators to agree before a bill can be taken up on the Senate floor.

Earlier this year, GOP lieutenant governor candidate Dan Patrick promised to reduce the influence of Democratic senators by weakening the rule and reducing the number of committees they chair. Patrick is a Houston senator.

On Wednesday, Whitmire interrupted a presentation by the comptroller’s office to discuss the sales-tax agricultural exemption.

He called it the “largest, broadest exemption we have.” Whitmire said urban tradesmen could view it as unfair, given they pay tax when they buy vehicles and equipment needed in their work. But the ag exemption has worked well, he said.

Then came the caveat.

“To preserve it, we need to make sure our rural members have a place at the table,” Whitmire said.

Senate Finance Committee Chairwoman Jane Nelson (2009 AP Photo/Harry Cabluck)

Sen. Robert Nichols, R-Jacksonville, said the Legislature tightened administration of the ag exemption in recent years. Beneficiaries have to attest they are engaged in food and fiber production, he said.

Whitmire, though, said that in the next revenue crunch, it and all other exemptions could be reviewed. The state may again face “challenges to find sufficient revenue,” putting the ag exemption at risk, he warned.

“The rural members should be mindful that the Senate rules currently allow them to block any consideration of repealing that,” he said.

Sen. Royce West, D-Dallas, interjected, “You talking about the two-thirds rule?”

Whitmire replied, “That would probably be the No. 1 thing that would come to my mind.”

A few minutes later, members of the panel began raising questions about the regressive effects of higher sales tax. Democrats mentioned Patrick’s proposal to decrease local school property taxes, perhaps by adding a penny or two to the state’s 6-1/4-cent sales tax.

Finance Committee Chairwoman Jane Nelson, R-Flower Mound, quickly cut them off, though.

She noted that higher sales tax is just one way to pay for property tax relief.

“Many of us would like to reduce property taxes,” Nelson said. “We’re going to look at a lot of different possibilities.”

Perry signs prostitution diversion bill modeled on Dallas County program

Dallas Police and Dallas County Sheriffs personel gather at the process center for The Prostitution Diversion Initiative that aims to get prostitutes off of the streets in South Dallas on March 6, 2013. (File photo: Brad Loper/The Dallas Morning News)

Women arrested for prostitution in the state’s largest counties could get the chance to rehab and rebuild their lives under a new law signed by the governor last week.

Gov. Rick Perry signed signed SB 484, which I wrote about earlier this month, during last week’s flurry of signatures and vetoes. The bill is modeled after Dallas County’s Prostitution Diversion Initiative, which aims to treat those in prostitution as victims rather than criminals by offering a shot at rehab and skills training in lieu of jail time.

Dallas County partners with Dallas police — an officer created the program in 2007 — and volunteer groups that offer services and transitional housing to the alleged prostitutes.

Sen. John Whitmire, D-Houston, said he was inspired by the Dallas County approach because it saves prison and jail beds for ”the people you’re afraid of.” Whitmire championed the Legislative proposal, which won broad bipartisan support among lawmakers and policy wonks in Austin. (Editorial writer Rodger Jones wrote about the emerging left-right criminal justice mind-meld earlier this month).

The law will require counties with more than 200,000 people — there are 22 of them in Texas — to start prostitution diversion programs of their own, contingent on receiving state or federal grant funding. That means Dallas County’s program is now enshrined in state law, and that Denton, Collin and Tarrant counties will have to follow suit.

Some of those counties’ officials said they were irked that they’ll have to put together new law-enforcement programs. Tarrant County already has a specialty court for most prostitution offenders, but will likely ramp up its efforts.

But in Dallas County, officials are thrilled. County Commissioner Elba Garcia and others had called for the state to adopt the law, and embattled District Attorney Craig Watkins said the law is “just smart policy.”

The law will go into effect on Sept. 1.

Gov. Perry signs Michael Morton Act into law

Gov. Rick Perry signs the Michael Morton Act into law on May 16 while Morton and bill author Sen. Rodney Ellis, D-Houston, look on.

Gov. Rick Perry on Thursday signed the Michael Morton Act into law with Morton and the senators and representatives who made it possible at his side.

Morton didn’t speak to the press, just smiled while Perry put ink to paper and kissed the pen after Perry was finished.

Authored by Sen. Rodney Ellis, D-Houston, and Sen. Robert Duncan, R-Lubbock, the act creates a uniform open-file policy that requires prosecutors to hand over all exculpatory evidence such at witness testimony or offense reports.

“Texas is a law-and-order state, and with that tradition comes a responsibility to make our judicial process as transparent and open as possible,” Perry said. “The bill helps serve that cause, making our system more fair and helping prevent wrongful convictions and any penalties harsher than what is warranted by the facts.”

Morton was exonerated in 2011 on DNA evidence after almost 25 years behind bars for the 1986 murder of then-wife Christine Morton. Among evidence withheld was a record of Morton’s son saying his father wasn’t the “monster” who murdered his mother. Prosecutors never made the interview available and Morton’s exoneration sparked investigation of Ken Anderson, the Williamson County prosecutor involved in the case.

“The road to justice … is not a jet plane ride, it’s a journey, and this bill is an important step on that journey,” Ellis said.

It is fitting, Perry said, that the signing come almost 50 years to the day of the Brady vs. Maryland decision that defines what evidence prosecutors must share in a criminal case.

Rep. Senfronia Thompson presented Morton with the gavel that banged his bill out of the House and to the governor’s desk. Even in the crowd behind him was Sen. Joan Huffman who on Tuesday said there was no need for a panel to study wrongful convictions.

“It would be so easy to waste the rest of your life being bitter over the part of your life that’s lost,” said Rep. Tryon D. Lewis, chair of the Judiciary and Civil Jurisprudence committee that sent the Senate bill to the House floor for a final vote. “It’s been quite the opposite.”

Gun-toting students a step closer to being allowed on college campuses

The Senate Criminal Justice Committee voted 4-2 to send a bill to the full Senate that will allow licensed gun holders to carry their weapons into classrooms and campus buildings.

During the hearing, commmittee chairman Sen. John Whitmire, D-Houston, said he favored the bill because it provides that public universities, after holding hearings, can opt-out and disallow weapons.

But opponents testified that campuses will have to go through the hearing exercise every year. And the bill removes any criminal charges for concealed handgun license holders who defy a campus ban and bring their weapons to class.

Supporters said they should have the right to protect themselves from crime and assaults that can happen on campus.

The Senate committee did not amend the bill that already has passed the House, allowing a provision to stand that revokes criminal penalties for defying a campuswide ban. Currently, the law provides misdemeanor charges against those who carry their guns into a place where weapons are banned. An exception would be made for colleges.

Sponsors of the bill said they beleive law-abiding citizens shouldn’t be penalized for mistakenly carrying their gun into a university building. They said that violators can be fired, expelled or face other disciplinary action — they just shouldn’t be charged with a crime.

Whitmire told several witnesses that testified against the bill — including college professors, nurses and counselors — that this should be a bill they could settle for. He said if this opt-out version didn’t get passed, then the tougher bill, mandating all public universities to allow guns, would resurface.

The tougher bill would likely be filed during a special session when Senate procedures change, so that a minority of senators couldn’t block a bill, Whitmire said.

As it is, Whitmire said the measure probably has the votes to pass the Senate. If it is sent to Gov. Rick Perry, who has publicly endorsed campus carry, it is likely to be signed into law.

Molly Cummings, an associate biology professor at the University of Texas, said she teaches students who believe a ‘C’ grade could be fatal for their dreams of medical school. College students are at an age when mental illness first surfaces, and mixing that with stress, pressure and guns is a bad combination, she said.

“There is a reason why most of the military academies in the United States do not permit students to carry weapons on campus,” Cummings said.

“If students who are trained to use weapons as part of their career are not allowed firearms on their campuses, why are we even thinking about allowing the general public CHL holders to carry within our classrooms?” she asked.

Whitmire joked that if professors handed out good grades, there wouldn’t be such concern.

“I got a great solution to your problem: Grade on the gun curve,” he said.

Gun bills go to carefully selected, friendly Senate committees

Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst, who assigns bills to Senate committees, appears to have directed the stout gun bills passed by the House to relatively safe harbors.

Criminal Justice, which is where most gun bills usually end up, is chaired by Democrat John Whitmire of Houston. He has said recently that he would give a hearing to the campus carry bill because it provides an opt-out for public universities whose presidents decide against allowing gun licensees to carry their weapons into campus buildings.

So Criminal Justice got the campus carry bill.

But other more contentious bills went to committees chaired by conservative Republicans.

The so-called “Firearm Protection Bill” and another similar bill that makes it a crime for law enforcement to “unlawfully” seize firearms (by following new federal mandates, if ever passed by Congress) went to Agriculture, Rural Affairs and Homeland Security, chaired by Craig Estes of Wichita Falls.

And the bill establishing school marshals who would be authorized, after 80 hours of training, to keep a locked gun in school houses for emergencies went to the Education Committee, chaired by Dan Patrick of Houston.

The Senate committees will hold their own hearings on the 13 gun bills passed in the House, which made getting a license easier and quicker, and pushed for nullification of any further federal restrictions on guns and ammunition.

Whether all of them will reach the Senate floor will depend. Senate rules require that two-thirds of the members agree to debate a bill — or 21 votes. If all of the Republicans back all of the bills, they will need to win over two Democrats before a debate can happen.

Prison health care in critical condition

Texas senators acknowledged in a floor debate that health care services for the state’s 150,000 inmates is spotty enough to border on neglect.

Sen. John Whitmire, D-Houston, chairman of the Criminal Justice Committee, said the state should add more hospitals to compete with the two teaching hospitals that currently are providing the care.

But hospitals run by Texas Tech and the University of Texas have been agitating for more money to continue their services to inmates. They also have been talking about getting out from under the state contract because they are losing money.

Whitmire warned that health care is spread so thin that the state is “very, very close to being unconstitutional.”

For decades, the state prisions were overseen by federal courts because of the so-called Ruiz lawsuit, where the state was found guilty of widespread neglect and abuse of inmates, including the lack of health care services.

Sen. Tommy Williams, R-The Woodlands, said adding more public hospitals to compete for the health care contract is unlikely to solve the problem.

“I don’t want to see us go back to that [Ruiz],” Williams said.

He pointed out the state pays far less for inmate health care than anywhere else in the nation.

“Funding for the care is $10 per day. No one in the country even comes close, or even pays their administrative costs for that,” said Williams, who is chairman of the budget-writing Finance Committee.

Whitmire: Education, social services deserve billions, too, from state savings

Sen. John Whitmire, D-Houston, speaks with Sen. Judith Zaffirini, D-Laredo, in the June 2011 special session. (AP photo/Eric Gay)

Update at 12:56 p.m.: We’ve corrected the third paragraph, which in the original post misstated Perry and leaders’ position that rainy-day dollars should NOT be used recurring expenses. Also, sharp-eyed readers have reminded us that last week, three Democratic senators filed two bills that would draw down $4 billion to undo last session’s cuts to basic school aid, $500 million for college financial aid and the $50 million that would be needed in 2014-2015 as the state match for expanding Medicaid and drawing down $4 billion of additional federal money. You can read about those bills here.

Original item at 12:20 p.m.: The dean of the Texas Senate, a Democrat, is questioning why state GOP leaders won’t draw down rainy-day dollars to undo some of last session’s budget cuts to public schools and social services.

Sen. John Whitmire, D-Houston, sparred Monday with Sen. Troy Fraser, R-Horseshoe Bay, over the Republican leadership’s willingness to spend $2 billion from the rainy day fund to jump-start water supply projects — and perhaps an equal amount for roads and bridges.

Gov. Rick Perry and key GOP legislative chieftains oppose using the money to ease 2011′s cuts to education, Medicaid, early childhood intervention programs to make sure kids are ready for school and programs designed to prevent child abuse. The Republican governor and the leaders say the rainy day fund should be used only for “one-time expenditures,” not recurring expenses.

But Whitmire questioned that thinking, as the Senate Finance Subcommittee on Fiscal Matters heard Fraser’s bill to spend $2 billion of state savings on water projects.

“Water is a critical need, but what about education? … Would you support a one-time expenditure for education,” he asked Fraser.

Fraser replied, “Education’s not addressed in this bill.”

Whitmire countered, “Education might be even a higher priority” than water.

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