House District 132 – Katy & Cy-Fair
Special Legislative Session to address conservative priorities
Governor Abbott has called a special 30-day legislative session beginning July 18 to address conservative priorities which failed to pass in the just-completed regular session. A special session can only address issues that the governor specifically calls for, and Governor Abbott has added an ambitious 20 total items to the “call” for legislators to address.
The governor’s agenda for the special session includes several high-profile issues which failed to pass this year, including property tax reform with a rollback election, school finance reform, and privacy in public restrooms.
Also included in Governor Abbott’s call are three issues on which I filed bills this session:
- The governor wants legislators to address oppressive local ordinances that infringe on the rights of residents. I plan to re-file HB 522, which would rein in homeowners associations infringement on property owners’ rights to put up a religious display on their property.
- Heavy-handed annexation practices are included in the call as well. I plan to re-file several bills that I carried during this session which would end forced annexation of property owners who don’t want to live in a city, force cities to actually provide services to areas they annex, stem the trend of extraterritorial jurisdiction used to regulate property without providing any benefits (or the right to vote) to landowners, and provide more options for residents to influence the use of annexation.
Governor Abbott specifically asked for legislation to limit state spending to the growth in population plus inflation. I filed HB 936 this session to do just that, and I will be filing this legislation again.
- Mail ballot fraud has recently been brought to the forefront with arrests being made in Dallas County. Luckily, Governor Abbott has legislation on his desk right now, which would make coordinated efforts to steal mail ballots or coerce voters a new offense. This bill, which I filed and attached to another bill that reached the governor’s desk, will enable prosecutors to reach the orchestrators of this fraud, not just the low-level workers who carry out the orders. I will also be filing other legislation to address illegal mail ballot assistance.
Here are some of the other items on the lengthy list of issues to be addressed:
- Pass property tax reform with a lower threshold for a rollback election
- Creating a commission to find a real solution to school finance reform
- Increasing Teacher Pay by $1,000 without additional spending
- Increase the flexibility given to school administrators on hiring and retention practices
- Tweak the newly passed texting while driving ban to preempt all local ordinances
- Prohibit local taxpayer dollars from funding abortion providers, eliminating mandatory insurance coverage for abortions, and strengthening reporting requirements when something goes wrong during an abortion
- Extending the maternal mortality task force to help lower the number of deaths among new mothers
- School choice for parents of special needs students
- Speeding up local government permits and preventing local governments from changing the rules in the middle of a building project
- Passing the Texas Medical Board “sunset” bill to keep the agency running, so doctors can continue to be licensed and regulated in Texas.
Please feel free to contact me with support, opposition or questions as we move toward a special legislative session.
God bless Texas!
Mike Schofield
State Representative
House District 132
Katy & Cypress