Floor Pass

The Lead:

Payday loans have become one of the session’s hottest topics. Some lawmakers and consumer advocates have said this session is the time to impose some restrictions on the payday and auto-title lenders—which charge up 600 percent interest—before the industry becomes too rich and powerful to rein in.

The Senate passed John Carona’s  SB 1247 last Monday. It was an odd debate, which included Carona accusing some of his colleagues of “shilling” for the industry. In the end, the Senate strengthened what had been a watered-down compromise bill. The measure, as passed by the Senate, would place a hard cap on the amount of interest lenders could charge. Some advocates—and Carona too—feared the beefed-up bill now has no chance to pass.

We’ll begin to find that out today when the House Investments and Financial Services Committee is scheduled to hear the payday loan bill.

Weekend Headlines:

1. Last Friday, the House passed HB 1025, an $875 million supplemental spending bill to provide funds for public schools and wildfire relief during the 2013 fiscal year, the Observer’s Liz Farmer reports. In addition to the original bill, an amendment passed that would reserve recovery funds for West, Texas.

2. According to the Quorum Report, the House has set a calendar for next Saturday, May 4. The first working weekend will hear a sunset bill for the Texas Department of Criminal Justice.

3. The Austin American-Statesman writes that lawmakers aren’t buying into Gov. Rick Perry’s $1.6 billion tax cut proposal.

Line of the Day:

“I still don’t believe he has done anything,” —Rep. Phil Stephenson about former U.S. House Majority Leader Tom DeLay’s money laundering conviction, as quoted by the San Angelo Standard-Times.

What We’re Watching Today:

1. The House Investments and Financial Services Committee will hear Sen. Carona’s payday loan bill that caused so much stir in the Senate.

2. A major water bill will reach the House floor today. It would instruct the comptroller to allocate money from the rainy day fund to water infrastructure projects. Some Democrats and tea partiers are rumored to oppose it.

3. The Senate Finance Subcommittee on Fiscal Matters is going to be discussing franchise tax exemptions today.

After a few tiffs, the House approved an $875 million supplemental spending bill to provide funds for public schools and wildfire relief during the 2013 fiscal year.

House Bill 1025 allocates $500 million for public schools and $161 million for wildlife relief. An amendment also passed that would reserve recovery funds for West, Texas. The amendment is a placeholder until lawmakers better know how much recovery from the fertilizer plant explosion will cost.

The House overwhelmingly turned down an attempt to put $60 million toward volunteer firefighters. Most of the 15 people who died in the West catastrophe were first responders. However, representatives could only move funds around—they couldn’t add or subtract money from the bill. Rep. David Simpson (R-Longview) wanted to fund the volunteer firefighters because he said the funds were supposed to go to them all along and hadn’t, but Democrats said Simpson’s amendment would take funds away from the free and reduced lunch program for school kids.

Rep. Helen Giddings (D-DeSoto) pressed Simpson to explain his reasoning. “Would you agree that no child in this state should go to bed hungry while we can do something about it?” Giddings asked.

Rep. Gene Wu (D-Houston) said the change would be detrimental. “This is not a problem for a few kids,” Wu said. “This is a problem for half the kids in my community.” After Rep. Naomi Gonzalez teared up while describing the nights growing up when she went to sleep hungry, Wu tweeted “I think a lot of House members don’t know what it means to be poor.”

The Lead:

A House committee approved a campaign finance reform bill yesterday that would require certain nonprofits to disclose their political fund-raising. It’s the same bill the Senate passed, then tried to recall last week by asking the House to, in a highly unusual move, give the bill back (the House said no).

The bill, SB 346  by Sen. Kel Seliger (R-Amarillo), would require groups like Texans for Fiscal Responsibility, and its tea party enforcer Michael Quinn Sullivan (no friend of Speaker Joe Straus), to disclose the people donating to their political operations. Texans for Fiscal Responsibility has been a major player in campaigns the past several elections, challenging Straus’ leadership team for being, in its view, insufficiently conservative. The group doesn’t have to disclose much of the money it spends on Texas politics. The bill would bring that secret action into the light, requiring groups that spend more than $25,000 on an election cycle to report donors to the Texas Ethics Commission.

As Quorum Report writes, the House State Affairs Committee passed the bill with no amendments. It now goes to the House floor. If the full House passes the bill without any changes, the measure would go straight to the governor—no conference committee.  You’d think the bill likely faces a veto. But if it does pass, it would remove much of the secret money in Texas politics.

Yesterday’s Headlines:

1. Juvenile facility workers put kids into solitary confinement for a myriad of reasons, but a bill by Sen. Leticia Van de Putte could change that practice. The Observer’s Patrick Michels writes that not everyone agrees on the proposed change to limit solitary confinement for kids.

2. The UT soap opera continues. A House committee heard  a Senate bill to limit the UT Regents power, as the Observer’s Beth Cortez-Neavel reports.

3. Another repeat episode is Sen. Brian Birdwell’s attempt to revive legislation that’d allow people to carry weapons onto college campuses if they had a concealed handgun license, as the Texas Tribune reports.

Line of the Day:

“It should not matter that as diverse as I am—being gay, disabled, Latino and a veteran—I am a person of this great state. Anyone, regardless of race, color, culture, age, religion, ethnicity, sex, disability, orientation, gender identity or expression—each person deserves the same equal opportunity as each of you representing this great state, no matter who we are.” –Retired Marine Staff Sgt. Erica Alva told a hearing on prohibiting discrimination against LGBTQ workers.

What We’re Watching Today:

1. The Senate Finance Subcommittee on Fiscal Matters will hear two bills that would provide exemptions on the franchise tax, which already doesn’t bring in enough money. The plan is, of course, acclaimed by Gov. Rick Perry. His plan would cost about $1.6 billion over the next two years and he said the “money does more good in the hands of taxpayers than it does in the hands of government,” reported The Dallas Morning News. The committee will also hear Sen. Chuy Hinojosa’s bill to impose a fee on cigarettes.

2. Rep. Bill Callegari’s bill in the House Homeland Security and Public Safety Committee would allow people to drive 10 mph over the speed limit without getting fined. That may be the most sensible bill the Lege has considered all session.

3. The Homeland Security Committee will also hear Rep. Yvonne Davis’ bill that would require drug tests for people applying for a Concealed Handgun License. If it’s good enough for welfare applicants….

4. Texas is the land of high stakes testing, and apparently it happens as early as kindergarten and pre-K. The Senate Education Committee will hear Sen. Leticia Van de Putte’s bill to curtail such testing.