Today is the first day to file bills for the 2019 Texas Legislature, and local lawmakers have been busy, News Radio 1200 WOAI reports.
Sate Rep Lyle Larson filed the 'Texas Loves Sunshine Act,' which would abolish Daylight Saving Time in Texas.State Rep.
Ina Minjares introduced a bill to make theft of mail a state crime. Police have expressed frustration with overlapping jurisdictions hindering investigations into theft of mail from large communal mailboxes.
State Sen. Judith Zafferini filed several bills, including one to sexual harassment in the work place a criminal offense. Zafferini also wants to outlaw driving while talking on a hand held cell phone while driving statewide. Currently, only texting while driving is outlawed outside the San Antonio city limits.
Several bills have been introduced to allow the cultivation of marijuana for medicinal purposes. A bill has been introduced to make Election Day a state holiday, and to allow woman to breast feed babies inside the State Capitol.
There is also a bill to require an annual, rather than the current biennial, state budget to be adopted, a bill to allow people in a local jurisdiction to vote to legalize so called 'eight liner' gambling machines, and removing the 'offense of homosexual conduct' from the state's books. All homosexual conduct laws were thrown out in the U.S. Supreme Court Lawrence v. Texas in 2003.
Minjarez also filed a bill that would start the ball rolling toward registering 'driverless' cars in the state, and a bill to allow a person to register to vote when applying for a renewing a drivers license.
San Antonio State Rep Diego Bernal, who wrote the San Antonio non discrimination ordinance while a member of City Council, wants to ban housing discrimination based on 'gender identity.'
A bill has been filed that would prohibit Texans from owning so called 3-D printed firearms.
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