TexasCHLforum.com

CobraRon wrote:

artx wrote:Looks like House appointed conference committee members....but the website doesn't list who they are (yet?)!!! This one has me nervous.

http://www.legis.state.tx.us/BillLookup ... Bill=SB321

They show it on the "History" tab:
House Conferees: Appointed (05/19/2011) Kleinschmidt (Chair) | Fletcher | Geren | Guillen | Hardcastle

thanks! Either I just missed it or it wasn't updated when I looked! Great news.

Looks like House appointed conference committee members....but the website doesn't list who they are (yet?)!!! This one has me nervous.

http://www.legis.state.tx.us/BillLookup ... Bill=SB321

I see that SB321 (parking lots, passed Senate already) was assigned to Business and Industry. Do we need B&I to report out this bill? Or if calendars schedules a vote for HB681, is that enough?

link here http://www.legis.state.tx.us/BillLookup ... Bill=SB321

Finished my fax's to House B&I last night.

Called all 7 Reps today - had some interesting responses (responses below). I thanked the co-authors for their support, all for the quick hearing, and urged all to vote the bill out favorably on Monday 2/28/11 with no amendments:

Chairman Joe Deshotel (D-Port Author ) Co-Author
Very polite staffer answered, she listened and after I said "please vote the bill out favorably" she cut in and said (in a very positive tone) "with no amendments right"

I said, why yes!

She said they had had a ton of calls and it was 'great how well organized your group is!' in a very positive tone. She sounded proud that Rep Deshotel was a co-author. I thanked her again.

Vice Chairman Rob Orr (R-Burleson) Co-Author
Said they'd pass along my position.
Rep. Chente Quintanilla (D-El Paso) Co-Author
No one answered, left message
Rep. Dwayne Bohac (R-Houston) Co-Author
No one answered, left message
Rep. Burt Solomons (R-Carrollton) Co-Author
seemed disinterested and sounded like they wrote down a tick mark for the call.
Rep. Sid Miller (R-Stephenville) Co-Author
No one answered, left message
Rep. Paul Workman (R-Austin) Co-Author
No one answered, left message
Rep. John Garza (R-San Antonio) Not a co-author
Said, Yes, we are planning on doing exactly that (voting favorably with no amendments). I especially thanked the staffer for the Rep's support.
Rep. Helen Giddings (D-Dallas) Not a co-author
Interested lady took down my personal info and verified I wanted no amendments. Kind of made me wonder what others were asking them to do.

Calling the Reps (or Senator's) offices is always an interesting case. It is kind of intimidating to do it, but gets much easier the more calls you make. The staffers run the gamut of very friendly and interested to sounding like you are interrupting them balancing 6 pans of boiling water and really don't want to talk to you! I always thank them and am polite regardless of the level of interaction.

Thanks to all that have called and faxed! On Monday, it will be time to call the Senators.

Sent a round of faxes today. Will call tomorrow. Major thanks to all that have called and faxed in support of HB681!!!

FYI anyone without a landline phone that still wants to fax, can use an internet fax service - there are a ton of web fax services out there. With many of them, you can send a specially formatted email and it will send the fax for you (I use greenfax.com because it was a 'pay as you go' and 7c/a minute, but there are a ton of them out there).