Texas Parks and Wildlife Commission
Finance Committee
May 30, 2001
Commission Hearing RoomTexas Parks & Wildlife Department Headquarters Complex
4200 Smith School Road
Austin, TX 78744
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6 BE IT REMEMBERED that heretofore on the 30th day
7 of May, 2001, there came on to be heard matters under the
8 regulatory authority of the Parks and Wildlife Commission
9 of Texas, in the Commission Hearing Room of Texas Parks
10 and Wildlife Headquarters Complex, Austin, Travis County,
11 Texas, beginning at 11:27 a.m., to wit:
12 APPEARANCES:
THE PARKS AND WILDLIFE COMMISSION
13
Finance Committee Chair: Ernest Angelo, Jr.
14 Lee M. Bass, Ft. Worth, Texas, Chairman
John Avila, Jr., Fort Worth, Texas
15 Alvin L. Henry, Houston, Texas
Carol E. Dinkins, Houston, Texas, Vice-Chair
16 Ernest Angelo, Jr., Midland, Texas
Katharine Armstrong Idsal, Dallas, Texas
17 Mark E. Watson, San Antonio, Texas
Phil Montgomery, Dallas, Texas
18 Joseph Fitzsimons, San Antonio
19 THE PARKS AND WILDLIFE DEPARTMENT:
20 Andrew Sansom, Executive Director
Other personnel of the Parks and Wildlife Department
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22
23
24
25
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1 FINANCE COMMITTEE
2 * * * * * * * * * *
3 MAY 30, 2001
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5 11:27 A.M.
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7 COMMISSIONER ANGELO: The first item of
8 business for the Finance Committee would be approval of
9 the committee minutes from the previous meeting.
10 Do I hear a motion to that effect?
11 COMMISSIONER HENRY: Moved.
12 COMMISSIONER ANGELO: Any corrections or
13 additions?
14 COMMISSIONER FITZSIMONS: Second.
15 COMMISSIONER AVILA: Second.
16 COMMISSIONER ANGELO: All in favor say aye.
17 Minutes have been approved. The first item of
18 business is a briefing from the Chairman's charges from
19 Mr. Sansom. Andy?
20 BRIEFING - CHAIRMAN'S CHARGES
21 MR. SANSOM: Yes, sir. Mr. Chairman,
22 briefly one of the key charges to this committee was to
23 implement the authority and direction given by this recent
24 legislature and fully participate in the Sunset Review.
25 You will be receiving a full briefing on the outcome of
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1 the Sunset legislation this morning.
2 You've asked us and directed us to ensure
3 uninterrupted service of the Texas Outdoor Connection,
4 which is the largest automated licensing implementing
5 system in the world. And Jayna Burgdorf will brief you on
6 the status of our new system, which goes into effect this
7 summer.
8 You've directed us to enhance marketing and
9 promotion opportunities. And I'm happy to report to you
10 that as of May 18th, we've sold over 15,000 of the horny
11 toad license plates which have produced about $3,011,000
12 in gross revenue. As of May 18, the Avila plate has sold
13 a total of 351. And you should be seeing those on the
14 road this month. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
15 COMMISSIONER ANGELO: Our Item No. 2 on the
16 agenda is a briefing again on the Financial Review Update
17 from Suzy Whittenton, who will present a financial review
18 for fiscal year 01. Suzy?
19 ITEM NO. 2 - BRIEFING - FINANCIAL REVIEW UPDATE
20 MS. SUZY WHITTENTON: Thank you. For the
21 record, I'm Suzy Whittenton, Chief Financial Officer.
22 Today I'll cover quickly the current revenue status of our
23 accounts, the status of expenditures compared to budgets
24 and then show you our time line for next year's operating
25 budget preparation.
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1 Start with Account 9, which is the Game, Fish
2 and Water Safety account where we deposit license fees and
3 boat registrations. And then I'll show you an estimated
4 ending cash balance for fiscal year end on that account.
5 When we compare the total number of license
6 sales from this year to last year, the numbers sold are
7 down slightly about two-and-a-half percent. However, the
8 super combo sales are up nearly 19 percent. Regular
9 resident hunting or fishing licenses and non-resident
10 hunting and fishing licenses are down, as are stamp sales.
11 And although the number of licenses sold are down, the
12 total revenue from this source is up, primarily due to the
13 success of the super combo. And we've sold just under
14 two-and-a-half million licenses and stamps so far this
15 year.
16 When we look at just straight hunting licenses or hunting
17 and combination licenses sold, the number's actually up
18 over last year when you include the combination sale --
19 combination licenses. These numbers have not changed much
20 since the last meeting. A total of 1,046,000 hunting type
21 licenses have been sold as of the month of May.
22 Fishing license sales are pretty close to even
23 when compared to this same period last year. Combination
24 sales are up. Resident fishing and resident non --
25 non-resident fishing sales are down. Since the last
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1 meeting we've sold an additional 245,000 fishing licenses.
2 This is probably due to the excellent lake conditions and
3 time of year. We've currently sold 1,385,000 fishing and
4 combination licenses.
5 And as I said earlier, license revenue is up by
6 just under $2 million or 3.3 percent over this same period
7 last year. Part of the increase, as I said, is due to the
8 continued shift to the super combo from other types of
9 licenses and, also, $700,000 of it is due to the increase
10 in the saltwater stamp fee.
11 It's important to remember that we don't base
12 our budget strictly on last year's revenue, and we tend to
13 budget more conservatively. And so we have collected
14 almost 97 percent of the license revenue that we counted
15 on to fund our budget. And at this point we actually
16 expect to exceed the budgeted amount here. But it shows
17 of the $62 million that we've budgeted, we've collected
18 almost all of it at this point.
19 Turning to boat registration and titling fees,
20 which are also deposited in that fund, in Fund 9, we had
21 projected $13.5 from that source. The conservative
22 revenue estimate and -- as of the end of April, revenue
23 was up $338,000 over the same period last year. And you
24 can see it's likely that that number will be higher.
25 As of the end of the April, we had collected
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1 53 percent of the budgeted revenue or 7.2 million of that
2 $13.5 million that we budgeted or projected, and continue
3 to believe that we'll meet or exceed that target.
4 The estimated ending balance of unobligated
5 funds in this account is expected to be at least $3
6 million by year end. This takes into account all -- it
7 substracts out all the dedicated amounts and anticipated
8 encumbrances. So we think we'll have $3 million just
9 unobligated to start the next fiscal year with.
10 Now, in the State Parks account, Account 64,
11 we'll look at revenue status and projected cash balances.
12 When you compare the period September through April,
13 revenue's about 10 percent lower this year than last year,
14 10-and-a-half percent. As we've discussed in previous
15 meetings, weather conditions weren't ideal in the winter
16 and fall months and so park revenue was down. And also in
17 the year 2000, we had significantly higher revenue than
18 normal. So we're not surprised by these numbers, nor are
19 we concerned at this point about being able to fund the
20 current operating budget from State park funds -- State
21 park fees. We didn't base our budget, again, on last
22 year's revenue numbers.
23 The parks-funded budget was based on $23 million
24 in estimated park fees. And even with the slow start this
25 year, the current projections indicate we will exceed that
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1 amount. So the current estimate is $23.3 million. And if
2 the summer months are good, as they have been in the last
3 couple of months, that estimate -- it will end up -- we'll
4 come in higher than the $23.3. This is so dependent on
5 weather.
6 This graph shows the trend in park revenue over
7 the last six years. And you can see that revenue seemed
8 to have peaked in the year 2000 and it's now dropping back
9 off. Our estimate is now about at what we did in fiscal
10 year '99. Again, our 2001 estimate could easily come in
11 higher than this current projection.
12 The $23 million we included in our budget, we've
13 already collected $13.3 or about 58 percent.
14 Historically, we collect most of our park revenue in the
15 spring and summer months, so we don't expect to have any
16 trouble collecting the remaining $9.7 million.
17 This pie chart shows when park revenue tends to
18 be collected. You can see that 64 percent of it tends to
19 come in the third and fourth quarters, which is March
20 through August. And the numbers we've been reporting on
21 today are only revenue through April. So there are still
22 four more historically high revenue months unreported at
23 this time.
24 We're projecting to have $2.3 million
25 approximately in unobligated balances at year end in this
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1 account, and this is not far off from what we usually have
2 to start the year off. So that's good news.
3 And I'll show you where we are in terms of
4 spending and our current operating budget and then let you
5 know of our plans for the next year's operating budget.
6 As of the end of April, which is two-thirds
7 through the fiscal year, we've spent 65 percent of
8 budgeted funds. This includes all payables and
9 encumbrances and shows that we're about where we should
10 expect to be for cash flow purposes in the year.
11 And this time of year is when we start focusing
12 on the coming year's operating budget. Last week we had
13 our budget kickoff meeting to begin the collection of
14 budget data by division. And we've decided this year to
15 prepare a zero-based budget, so divisions will have to
16 request every dollar from zero up in this process.
17 Submissions are due from each division on June the 8th and
18 then we'll have presentations to executive staff in late
19 June.
20 If the Commission would like to have a budget
21 workshop, work session, we would like to get that
22 scheduled in advance -- in enough time in advance of the
23 August Commission meeting. At that meeting, we'll be
24 asking for your final approval on the FY02 budget.
25 COMMISSIONER MONTGOMERY: Is this the first
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1 time a zero-based budgeting has been used? Is it --
2 MS. SUZY WHITTENTON: The first time at
3 least in some number of years. We've been using a
4 procedure called 95 percent budgeting, where each division
5 was required to cut five percent and show the executive
6 staff where they take their cuts from. But they were kind
7 of -- the first 95 percent was kind of a given that -- and
8 this time we thought we would try it a little differently,
9 see how it works.
10 MR. SANSOM: We wanted to -- we have a
11 natural resistance as a culture to just assuming a base,
12 but, yet, it had become pretty obvious to us that 95
13 percent had become an exercise that had lost a lot of its
14 impact. So we -- so we're going to go back and try to do
15 it from the ground up this year. We're pretty excited
16 about it.
17 I would echo something that Ms. Whittenton has
18 just said that, members, while you're here this week, we
19 would like for you to look at your calendars and see
20 whether there's a possibility of a workshop session on the
21 budget sometime in mid July to the first week of August so
22 that we can bring you more fully into this process prior
23 to the time that you'll be presented with its final
24 adoption in August.
25 COMMISSIONER ANGELO: That work session is
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1 vital, I think. We really need to. Last year, we let it
2 get by without the full Commission getting involved in it.
3 And I think it's important that we, at this meeting, try
4 to get together on a date that gets all or most of us to
5 do this.
6 Does anyone have any questions or comments? I
7 guess before entertaining the first one of those, I would
8 like to point out something that kind of went by fairly
9 fast, but I think it's real significant and hopefully it's
10 a trend.
11 But the total hunting licenses sold as of May 16
12 are up 3.6 percent. And that's -- that's something we
13 haven't seen much of in the recent times. And even though
14 the numbers are kind of confusing to understand and in
15 terms of what they really mean, I think that one stands
16 out as something significant to us all.
17 Are there any other comments or questions?
18 Hearing none, we'll move on to the next item on the
19 agenda, which, again, is a briefing. And this time it's a
20 the automated license system.
21 To bring us up-to-date, Suzy is presenting this
22 with Jayna Burgdorf, I believe, as the main commentator.
23 Jayna?
24 BRIEFING - ITEM NO. 3 - LICENSE POINT OF SALE UPDATE
25 MS. BURGDORF: Hi. Members of the
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1 Commission, my name is Jayna Burgdorf, and I'll be
2 updating you on the status of our transition from our
3 automated license system, which is currently managed by
4 Transactive and which will be operated by WorldCom.
5 We're going to be selling licenses on two
6 different platforms. One will be a P.C. and the other
7 will be a point-of-sale terminal. The P.C. will be
8 provided by our license agents along with their own
9 Internet connection. The printer will be provided by
10 WorldCom. And this setup will be used by our own offices
11 as well as low-volume licensed deputies which sell less
12 than 100 licenses per year.
13 Nancy Collins, who's the director of World
14 Markets -- excuse me, Government Markets for WorldCom came
15 and met with us last week with Andy and committed to the
16 dates that I'm going to present to you today. The
17 roll-out for the P.C. system is as follows: The
18 application will be fully developed and ready for pilot by
19 June 30 -- June 20th; excuse me. The training via
20 computer, video and help desk and equipment deployment
21 will start June 11th. Live sales of recreational licenses
22 will start June 30th. And then our own offices who sell
23 the commercial licenses will actually start those sales on
24 July 21st.
25 The second application, the hypercom
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1 point-of-sale terminal, similar to the equipment that we
2 use right now with the improvements of a bar code reader,
3 a built-in receipt printer and a touch screen. It's
4 primarily used by higher volume retailers, and, again,
5 those are folks that sell more than 100 licenses per year.
6 Now, the date that's on the slide and that's in
7 your packet has changed as of yesterday for the classroom
8 training and equipment deployment. We agreed with
9 WorldCom yesterday to move that to the 18th. They wanted
10 a little bit of extra time, and we were wanting to use
11 that extra time to both review the training. And we also
12 got them to agree to spread the training throughout the
13 summer. That better matches what our licensed deputies
14 want in terms of training instead of consolidating it in a
15 three-week period. That also doesn't change the critical
16 dates of development being ready by June 30th and live
17 sales starting on July 14th.
18 Okay. This is our coverage by county. These
19 are sales location. The yellow are where we have no
20 agents selling licenses. And this is true under the
21 Transactive system. So these are not new locations where
22 people are just dropping out of the system. That's
23 probably true in one location where an individual was
24 asked if they would take the P.C. version; they're a low
25 volume seller. They declined. We asked them, "Well, if
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1 we provide it for free, the full setup, the hypercom
2 terminal, would you continue to sell?" No. They didn't
3 think they were interested in continuing to sell anymore.
4 But, in general, these are counties where we haven't had
5 sales for a while.
6 The green are counties where we have only a low
7 volume seller. The P.C. agent basically sells less than
8 100 licenses per year, and they're going to continue with
9 the system. And then the vast majority of the state is
10 covered by counties where there is at least one higher
11 volume seller of licenses.
12 The final point I want to make is that we have
13 preliminary indications from our legal counsel that we
14 will need to require Social Security numbers for license
15 sales for child support enforcement purposes, because with
16 this new system we will have an updated DPS driver's
17 license database. When you input your driver's license
18 either by keying it in or mag stripe, that information
19 will automatically be updated in the file. The sales
20 clerk will not see an individual's Social Security number,
21 but the actual information will be transferred to the
22 Attorney General in a database file. So that's going to
23 be a change for our customers to some extent. It will be
24 invisible for the vast majority of them who use their
25 driver's license anyway. And it will be a little bit of a
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1 change, then, for our license agents who right now request
2 a Social Security number but do not require it.
3 And I'll be happy to answer any questions.
4 CHAIRMAN BASS: Jayna, for the youth
5 license that are required for, you know, the tags,
6 basically, they obviously -- most of them won't have a
7 driver's license.
8 MS. BURGDORF: Right.
9 CHAIRMAN BASS: Is there a way to kind
10 of -- and they won't, I wouldn't think, have child support
11 obligations.
12 MS. BURGDORF: Right.
13 CHAIRMAN BASS: But they also may not have
14 a Social Security number or remember it or have it with
15 them.
16 MS. BURGDORF: Right.
17 CHAIRMAN BASS: Is there a way to opt them
18 out of that?
19 MS. BURGDORF: At this point, we're
20 planning on not requesting anyone's Social Security number
21 if they're under 18. So that's the plan.
22 CHAIRMAN BASS: So if you have a driver's
23 license and you're under 18, you're never really going to
24 know that this happens?
25 MS. BURGDORF: Right. Well, if you have a
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1 driver's license and you use it to purchase your license,
2 you probably won't know that this is happening at all.
3 So...
4 COMMISSIONER ANGELO: Any other questions
5 or comments?
6 COMMISSIONER MONTGOMERY: Are you all
7 confident you have the managerial and contractual
8 commitment now from WorldCom to roll it out on schedule?
9 I know that was a question a few weeks ago.
10 MS. BURGDORF: Right. And I believe that
11 having the Director of Government Markets -- basically,
12 she's probably two or three folks down from the Chairman
13 of the Board. So she's, you know, the little top person
14 in this unit, in this section of Worldcom. This is an
15 extremely visible project for them. We know for a fact
16 that they've already applied more resources to this
17 project than they anticipated. So they have every
18 interest making it a success. So we believe that they're
19 going to do what it takes to get this done and get these
20 licenses sold.
21 COMMISSIONER ANGELO: Anything else? Thank
22 you. Very good.
23 Item 4 on our agenda is another briefing on
24 legislative update from Joey Park.
25 BRIEFING - ITEM NO. 4 - LEGISLATIVE UPDATE
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1 MR. SANSOM: Mr. Chairman, I've asked both
2 Joey and Suzy and Harold Stone, who worked on our
3 legislative team, to present this briefing to you. These
4 are the three officers of the Department most -- who were
5 most involved in the legislative process.
6 MS. WHITTENTON: Thank you, Andy. I'm just
7 going to cover real quickly the appropriations bill and
8 then turn it over to Joey to handle all other legislative
9 action.
10 So I thought we would start with SB-1, which is
11 a General Appropriations Act, and look at quickly the
12 differences between what we asked for and what we
13 ultimately ended with and then some of the changes that
14 were made to our riders.
15 Just as a quick reminder, what we asked for was
16 base level funding with the addition of five million
17 dollars per year for park services. And with that five
18 million dollars, this was new money, general revenue and
19 81 new employees. We also asked for eight million dollars
20 a year in new money for -- to be able to set up a
21 scheduled facility repair program. And we asked for just
22 the authority to spend the money that we earn from
23 saltwater stamp fee on licensed buy-backs. We have the
24 money, the cash; we just don't have the authority to spend
25 it. We asked for that.
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1 We also asked for our entrepreneurial rider,
2 which we lost last session. So we've gone two years
3 without it. We asked for the authority to have that back.
4 What that does for us is it allows us to spend -- if we
5 earn more money than we originally project, if we bring in
6 more money, we can spend it and it doesn't just sit there
7 in our funds.
8 Okay. What we ended up getting is -- is -- the
9 first thing that happened was they -- the legislative
10 budget board staff took a cut to our base of
11 two-and-a-half million from Account 9 for what they
12 identified were one-time only projects. They were called
13 conservation education projects.
14 The good news was they did act on all of our
15 other requests. They gave us -- out of the five million
16 that we asked for in park services, they did give us
17 $4.2 million of new money, general revenue money, and the
18 authority to hire the 81 full-time employees.
19 The other $800,000 per year, they gave us the
20 authority to spend out of our own State parks account, if
21 the money should be there.
22 And then for the facility repairs, the
23 legislature approved general obligation bonds, a big bond
24 package that will be voted on in November. That includes
25 money for the backlog of repairs that we still have, gave
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1 us money to set up a scheduled repair program, but it also
2 includes money for the battle ship, the Nimitz and San
3 Jacinto, Sheldon. Is that it?
4 They also included our entrepreneurial rider,
5 and the entrepreneurial rider will also allow us to spend
6 the money, the saltwater stamp fee increase, on license
7 buy-backs. So that rider alone covered two of our
8 original requests.
9 Another thing that the legislature acted on this
10 session was they granted employee pay raises, which is
11 great news for our employees. It was a four percent pay
12 raise or $100 a month, whichever is greater, but it
13 presented something of a budget challenge, because they
14 didn't give us money -- new money to come up with the pay
15 raises. So that will hit our cash balances pretty hard.
16 In fact, our estimate is about five million dollars a year
17 is what that will cost us.
18 And then at the end of the session, additional
19 funds were added for Hermann Park. New general revenue
20 money was added to the local park funds for that
21 particular park.
22 Also, some changes were made to some of our
23 riders. We had asked for the authority to -- for
24 landowner incentive program grants to be treated the same
25 way construction grants are treated, which means that
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1 they'll carry forward for five years or that landowner
2 will have five years to finish his program, which is good
3 for the landowner. Currently, they only have three years
4 to spend those funds.
5 One bit of bad news was we got a rider that
6 limits our out-of-state travel to 75 percent of what we
7 normally spend. So we're going to have to take a 25
8 percent cut in out-of-state travel.
9 CHAIRMAN BASS: Good things those national
10 meeting are in Texas.
11 MS. SUZY WHITTENTON: We'll have to start
12 trying to get all meetings to be in Texas.
13 And I think we talked before about the radio
14 systems requirement where our radios have to be
15 interoperable with DPS's radios by January. We don't
16 think that will be a problem.
17 State -- we asked to have land sale proceeds be
18 reappropriated so that we can -- once we sell land we can
19 use that money to buy additional land if we -- if there's
20 anything available, and we did get that authority.
21 One of the most important riders is the
22 commercial fishery license fee changes where we were
23 required to raise fees to cover the cost of that program.
24 There's some changes to our local parks rider,
25 which requires that certain amount of funds were used out
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1 of that local parks -- the local parks account.
2 The park restoration is for the Hermann Park;
3 money that we talked about earlier, and then some minor
4 things. They added some reporting requirements to us for
5 Game Wardens, FTEs, capital equipment, kind of extra
6 reporting we need to do to our oversight agencies. And
7 then, finally, this Lake Fort Parker and Lake Casa Blanca
8 that we've been asked to apply for federal funds for
9 these. One is a restoration project and one is a dredging
10 project.
11 MR. SANSOM: Members, I would like to say
12 that particularly because of the work for Harold and Suzy
13 and Harold Stone, whom you've met for the first time
14 today, this really -- the bottom line is this is the
15 largest increase in budgetary funds and authority in the
16 Department's history. It's going to be nearly $50 million
17 dollars in increases.
18 CHAIRMAN BASS: If the bonds pass.
19 MR. SANSOM: If the bonds pass. And they
20 will be on the ballet in November. And we will be working
21 with some of the other agencies in the next couple weeks
22 to try to determine how to approach that issue.
23 The issue that I think is important that we
24 bring to your attention today is that I did use the word
25 "authority". A lot of this is -- is -- is -- comes in the
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1 form of increased spending authority through the
2 entrepreneurial rider, but also increased mandated
3 expenditures including -- the largest one being the
4 employee pay raise. We will be, therefore -- as we get
5 through the summer - and one of the reasons why I believe
6 this workshop is so important - and in the fall,
7 presenting you with an analysis of our entire fee
8 structure from boats to commercial fisheries to
9 recreational hunting and fishing licenses and park fees to
10 determine what I believe will be some necessary
11 adjustments, upward adjustments, some of which were
12 mandated and some of which we will need to do. So that
13 will be a big task for us this summer and one that we will
14 want to alert you to as early as possible, that we are
15 looking at the increases.
16 CHAIRMAN BASS: I have a question on the
17 G.O. bonds. If that package passes, how many dollars will
18 come to the Department in this current biannual?
19 MS. SUZY WHITTENTON: It's $36 million.
20 And fiscal year 2003 is when it's appropriated. So we
21 actually couldn't get to it in the coming fiscal year.
22 CHAIRMAN BASS: So zero comes in --
23 MS. SUZY WHITTENTON: In 2002. There are
24 provisions in Article 9 that let you move money between
25 fiscal years. So it doesn't necessarily mean we can't get
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1 to any of it in 2002. But it's appropriated --
2 MR. SANSOM: But as a practical matter, if
3 you look at the bond process, the election will take place
4 in November. And even in our bonds, it often takes as
5 much as six to eight months to get through the bond sales
6 and issuance. So it will take most of --
7 MS. SUZY WHITTENTON: Probably until
8 February.
9 MR. SANSOM: Presuming they pass, it will
10 take a good part of the year just to issue them.
11 MR. JOEY PARK: Good morning,
12 Commissioners. My name is Joey Park. I'm the Director of
13 Intergovernmental Affairs. I've got a brief presentation
14 for you of bills that passed this session that affect the
15 Department.
16 First and most important bill that passed this
17 session was SB-305, our Sunset bill. Some of the
18 highlights and provisions of this bill include, first and
19 most importantly, it extends the agency for 12 more years.
20 Secondly, it calls for an increase in public
21 input into the Commission process.
22 SB-305 removes the reporting requirements for
23 law enforcement related to the racial profiling bill that
24 was passed this session. It will prohibit the advertising
25 of tobacco in any of our publications, and there will be
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1 an increase in oversight of employee fundraising.
2 SB-305 requires that the Department create a
3 land and water resource conservation plan. We'll be
4 required to improve our business oversight for the
5 Department's commercial ventures. It directs us to better
6 manage our education and outreach efforts, as well as
7 improving our capital projects process.
8 And, lastly, it makes changes to the private
9 oyster lease program as set forth in the State Auditor's
10 report last year.
11 Next, Senate Bill 2, the water bill. Some of
12 the provisions of SB 2 include the creation of the Texas
13 Water Advisory Council, which will provide guidance on
14 state water issues. It allows for surface water and
15 groundwater management to be consideration of natural
16 resources.
17 SB 2 ratifies the groundwater districts created
18 by SB-1911 of the 76th legislature last session. Lastly,
19 it establishes a joint committee on water resources with
20 an interim study on the appropriate role of environmental
21 and wildlife concerns on water permitting and developing,
22 including the protection of the natural condition of the
23 State-owned river beds.
24 SB-1173 provides for the issuance of up to nine
25 million dollars in revenue bonds to be used to finance the
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1 repair, renovation, improvement, expansion and equipping
2 of the Admiral Nimitz Memorial Naval Museum.
3 SB-1194 amends Parks and Wildlife Code, making
4 it a Class C Parks and Wildlife misdemeanor to hunt, sell,
5 purchase or possess a bat in this state. However, it does
6 not apply to a bat in a building occupied by people.
7 Certain authorized individuals, including licensed pest
8 control operators or a person transporting a bat that is a
9 threat to human health or safety.
10 SB-1410 gives the Parks and Wildlife Commission
11 the authority to establish and make rules governing a
12 closed season for crab traps in our public waters. This
13 period when waters are closed to crab traps will provide
14 an opportunity to remove and dispose of abandoned or
15 illegal traps in our Coastal water.
16 SB-1573 amends the Parks and Wildlife Code by
17 adding Chapter 32, floating cabins. Provide a general
18 prohibition of floating cabins in the saltwater of this
19 State. It allows the Department to adopt rules to
20 implement procedures for permitting the placement and
21 maintenance of floating cabins in our coastal water.
22 CHAIRMAN BASS: Good slides, by the way.
23 COMMISSIONER FITZSIMONS: Yeah. Those are
24 well-chosen.
25 CHAIRMAN BASS: You really went out of your
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1 way to make it look like an upscale community.
2 COMMISSIONER FITZSIMONS: Are there some
3 fees associated with that registration?
4 MR. JOEY PARK: Yes, sir, there are. Yes,
5 sir.
6 HB 63 amends a portion of the Transportation
7 Code to include automatic driver's license suspension for
8 a person on final conviction for boating while
9 intoxicated. It also allows or would authorize suspension
10 of a person's driver's license for their refusal to submit
11 to the taking of a specimen for committing an offense
12 involving operation of water craft. Basically, these
13 penalties would paralegal the same ones now in effect for
14 DWI. So it takes BWI to the same level.
15 HB-247. The purpose of this was to amend the
16 Texas Water Code by revising the language exempting
17 permitting requirements for a water impoundment up to
18 200-acre feet, to include the wildlife management purposes
19 for commercial or non-commercial use.
20 HB-1915. The purpose of this bill was to
21 require that a person who is mentally retarded and lives
22 at home with his family members could engage in
23 recreational fishing under the immediate supervision of a
24 volunteer who holds a fishing license and has permission
25 of that person's family's head or legal guardian to take
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1 the mentally retarded person fishing.
2 Current law only allows for hospital employees
3 to do this. This expands it to the family members or a
4 person authorized by the family members.
5 HB-3123 requires the Department to cooperate
6 with the Comptroller in developing and adopting new
7 standards for open space land used for wildlife
8 management.
9 HB-3209. If a commercial shrimp boat is legally
10 licensed and the only violation existing is that the owner
11 or operator failed to display the shrimp license or failed
12 to display the documentation or registration numbers as
13 required by law, the catch of shrimp on board the vessel
14 would not be seized or sold and no civil restitution would
15 be sought for the value of that shrimp. A citation would
16 be issued for the criminal violations of failure to
17 display. Current law requires that shrimp on board that
18 vessel would be ceased, sold and civil restitution
19 assessed.
20 Secondly, if a commercial shrimp boat is legally
21 licensed and the only violation that exists is the captain
22 of the vessel does not have a commercial shrimp boat
23 captain's license, the shrimp onboard the vessel could be
24 ceased and sold; however no civil restitution would be
25 assessed for the value of those shrimp. Current law
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1 requires that civil restitution be assessed for those
2 shrimp that are ceased.
3 That's the end of my presentation. I'll be
4 happy to answer any questions.
5 CHAIRMAN BASS: I would like to go back,
6 please, to the portion of the Sunset bill which deals with
7 commercial fishery license fees, et cetera, to recap a
8 little bit.
9 There was a State Auditor's report done at the
10 request of then Senator Ratliff --
11 MR. JOEY PARK: Senator Ratliff.
12 CHAIRMAN BASS: -- in the interim which
13 showed, I believe, it was -- was it nine million dollars
14 --
15 MR. JOEY PARK: That's correct.
16 CHAIRMAN BASS: -- of unrecovered costs in
17 the commercial fishery?
18 MR. JOEY PARK: Yes, sir.
19 CHAIRMAN BASS: The bulk of that was, I
20 believe, from commercial shrimping.
21 MR. JOEY PARK: Yes, sir.
22 CHAIRMAN BASS: A lot of the focus of
23 discussion during the session was dealing with the oyster
24 leases and the unrecovered costs associated there.
25 Would you review for me the final outcome of
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1 what the directive is in the Sunset bill as pertains to
2 the oyster leases as well as other fisheries such as
3 shrimping?
4 MR. JOEY PARK: The Sunset bill only
5 addresses the private oyster bed leases. It puts in code
6 that there is a term of the lease. It gives the
7 Department the authority to promulgate rules on drawing up
8 new contracts for the term of those leases. It specifies
9 some of the boundary demarcations that can be changed or
10 done, and it sets the floor of the lease per acre at six
11 dollars or an amount set by the Commission. It was three,
12 and it just moved the floor up to six dollars. Those are
13 the primary issues that were addressed.
14 At one time, it was thought that those leases
15 were in perpetuity, and it set those at 15 years.
16 CHAIRMAN BASS: Now, was there a rider
17 associated with the budget bill that also pertained to
18 this fee recovery of commercial fisheries?
19 MR. JOEY PARK: Yes, sir. There was a
20 rider in our appropriations bill pattern, which directed
21 the Department to adjust the fees for commercial fishing
22 in order to recover the cost to administer the program.
23 Now, don't quote me. That's not exactly how it was.
24 MS. SUZY WHITTENTON: Pretty close.
25 MR. JOEY PARK: That's pretty much what it
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1 said.
2 MR. SANSOM: And the entrepreneurial rider
3 was capped in the appropriations bill at approximately
4 nine million for the same reason. They used the same
5 basic calculation.
6 COMMISSIONER ANGELO: There's obviously
7 discretion involved in determining what those direct costs
8 are, is there not?
9 MR. JOEY PARK: Yes, sir, I believe that
10 was stated.
11 MR. SANSOM: And there's some disagreement.
12 COMMISSIONER ANGELO: As to what they
13 should be?
14 MR. SANSOM: When our biologists are out
15 surveying in the bays and estuaries of Texas, they don't
16 just serve one industry. They're serving a broad number
17 of purposes.
18 So -- but I think the way the language finally
19 came out was that that was good.
20 MR. JOEY PARK: Yes.
21 MR. SANSOM: No. 1, it allowed for us to
22 put some immediate reforms into this, particularly in the
23 oyster industry.
24 No. 2, it allowed us to use our normal processes
25 to incrementally begin to approach costs recovery in
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1 commercial fisheries. So it was real bad in the
2 beginning.
3 At one point in time, the legislation required
4 that oyster leases be raised from three dollars an acre to
5 $1,000 an acre, which would have destroyed the industry.
6 So I believe that it -- thanks to some good work and
7 involvement by the industry and interested members, it
8 came out probably about as good as it could have.
9 COMMISSIONER MONTGOMERY: Would it be
10 possible to put together a notebook with the Sunset bill
11 and then the text from these ones that I could read?
12 MR. JOEY PARK: Certainly. Absolutely.
13 Happy to do that for you.
14 COMMISSIONER MONTGOMERY: I would like to
15 read the actual text.
16 MR. JOEY PARK: I'll get that for you.
17 MR. SANSOM: Mr. Chairman, I would like to
18 particularly thank those members of the Commission, which
19 basically constitute a majority of the members of the
20 Commission, who participated with us in this legislative
21 session.
22 That, as you all have found out, makes all the
23 difference in the world to us. They can address us in one
24 manner, but they address you all in a completely different
25 manner and it's always positive. And we deeply appreciate
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1 those of you who went down there.
2 I should point out that Dr. McKinney was a major
3 player in the SB 2 negotiations and activities.
4 In this session, we probably had more support of
5 a general nature from outside interests than ever before.
6 And as Joey commented to me, it wasn't just reactive. We
7 felt the presence of a number of outside interests helping
8 us sort of move this whole agenda forward in a way that I
9 had not experienced in the six sessions that I've had the
10 privilege of working. Particularly, David Langford was
11 there almost every day, George Bristol from the Texas
12 Conservation Coalition and Jan Brown from Trust for Public
13 Lands, Brian Seibert from the Sierra Club and many, many
14 more. It was a wonderful show of support and one that we
15 deeply appreciate.
16 And, finally, I will tell you that in all the
17 years that I've been working in the legislature, I have
18 not had the privilege of working with as good a team as
19 Harold and Joey. And I want to let you know publicly how
20 deeply grateful I am for what you've done.
21 COMMISSIONER ANGELO: We appreciate it.
22 CHAIRMAN BASS: You made it seem painless.
23 I know it wasn't.
24 MS. SUZY WHITTENTON: They're tired.
25 CHAIRMAN BASS: I know firsthand it wasn't,
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1 but you made it look relatively easy.
2 MR. JOEY PARK: Thank you.
3 COMMISSIONER ANGELO: I'm sure they're
4 sorry the session is over, so they'll be bored.
5 COMMISSIONER FITZSIMONS: What are you
6 going to do with yourself now?
7 MR. JOEY PARK: I'm not sure yet;
8 decompress a little bit.
9 MS. SUZY WHITTENTON: Sleep
10 COMMISSIONER ANGELO: Any other comments or
11 questions? Again, thank you all.
12 COMMISSIONER FITZSIMONS: Well, I just have
13 one on SB 2. Does the Water Advisory Council provide for
14 Parks and Wildlife representatives in that advisory
15 council necessarily?
16 MR. JOEY PARK: Yes, sir, it does.
17 COMMISSIONER ANGELO: Thank you all.
18 MR. JOEY PARK: Thank you.
19 COMMISSIONER ANGELO: Mr. Chairman, I guess
20 you want to continue and finish this agenda?
21 CHAIRMAN BASS: Yeah. Let's go ahead and
22 finish this off.
23 COMMISSIONER ANGELO: Item No. 5 is an
24 action item which we'll take up tomorrow at the Commission
25 meeting, presumably, a stamp fee for disabled veterans.
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1 We'll have a presentation by Frances Stiles. Frances?
2 ACTION ITEM NO. 5 - STAMP FEE FOR DISABLED VETERANS
3 MS. FRANCES STILES: Hello. I'm Frances
4 Stiles. I'm with the Administrative Resources Division,
5 and I'll be presenting the proposal to add hunting and
6 fishing stamps to the disabled veterans hunting and
7 fishing license.
8 In order to get this in place before the new
9 license year, this has already been published in Texas
10 Register. We have received no comments on that proposal
11 at this time.
12 What this would do is it takes the hunting and
13 fishing combination license that is currently offered to
14 disabled veterans and it would add the five hunting stamps
15 and the two fishing stamps to this license. Currently,
16 the hunting and fishing license is there, available to
17 those who qualify under the Veterans Administration at no
18 fee. This would also add the stamps to this license at no
19 fee.
20 The definition for the disabled veteran are
21 those who are 60 percent or more disabled as defined by
22 the Veterans Administration. This is estimated to have a
23 fiscal impact of $43,000 to $46,000 to the agency.
24 And this is a -- this would impact these
25 sections under the Finance Chapter. Section 53.90 would
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1 be added.
2 Any questions?
3 COMMISSIONER ANGELO: Any questions or
4 comments?
5 If there's no objections from the Commission,
6 this will be placed on the agenda for discussion and
7 action tomorrow.
8 Hearing none, it will be done. And we thank
9 you.
10 MS. FRANCES STILES: Thank you.
11 COMMISSIONER ANGELO: Item No. 6 is another
12 action item. This is to be presented by Bob Cook with
13 regard to fleet policy.
14 ACTION ITEM NO. 6 - FLEET POLICY
15 MR. ROBERT COOK: Thank you, Mr. Chairman,
16 my name is Robert Cook. I'm Chief Operating Officer of
17 TEXAS PARKS AND WILDLIFE COMMISSION.
18 This is a -- primarily, I would call this is a
19 housekeeping item. In the 76th legislature two years ago,
20 there was a statewide fleet management plan established by
21 House Bill 3125, which requires us to meet certain rules
22 and regs within that plan, one of which, for example, was
23 that we hire a fleet manager at Texas Parks and Wildlife
24 Department, which I am glad to report that we did in May
25 of last year, Doug Schonberner was hired and has done us
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1 an excellent job and has done a great job of coordinating
2 with our divisions and with the people downtown at GSC and
3 with the Council on Competitive Government, who we work
4 all of these programs through.
5 The fleet management plan requires an adoption
6 of a plan by each agency. We have been working with those
7 folks on our fleet and what our fleet management plan will
8 say. It's been going pretty well.
9 One of the -- one of the things that happened
10 when this thing was implemented was they put a moratorium
11 on all of our vehicle purchase, all purchases. Then in
12 negotiating with them, we got some exemptions on some law
13 enforcement vehicles that we were able to purchase. And
14 with the implementation of this plan, with the acceptance
15 of this plan, that moratorium on acquisitions will be
16 removed, and we will be allowed to replace -- to purchase
17 replacement vehicles on a one-to-one basis. If we -- for
18 instance, if we choose to add vehicles to our current
19 fleet, add additional numbers of vehicles to our current
20 fleet, we've got to go through a fairly detailed and
21 fairly bureaucratic process of requesting and getting that
22 permission, building the justification for that. Part of
23 the statewide fleet management plan, of course, is to
24 control the number of vehicles in these various fleets
25 cross the state.
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1 Just to give you an idea of our fleet at Texas
2 Parks and Wildlife Department, we currently have about
3 something over 2100 vehicles. The average age of our
4 vehicle is almost eight years old. So that means we've
5 got some vehicles that are 25 and 30 years old. Now, that
6 may seem astonishing to you, but those of you who have
7 ranches and operate country like that -- many of our State
8 parks and wildlife management vehicles, those older
9 vehicles we may not put 1,000 miles a year on, but we use
10 them to haul trash or we use them to do specific jobs on
11 the ranch that you don't want a new vehicle out there
12 doing that kind of thing. So an average age of eight,
13 that scares a lot of people, but we operate quite well.
14 The average mileage of our fleet is over 76,000
15 miles. Now, again, that's lots of miles. But that means
16 you've got a lot of vehicles that have got 150,000 on them
17 as well as 25,000. But we -- our people are pretty
18 efficient with their vehicles. They take good care of
19 them. They stretch them out. They make them last a long
20 time. Again, that's a process that Doug is helping with
21 and that the various division directors are helping with.
22 This process requires that you -- or requests
23 that you adopt two rules in order for us to comply, and
24 you see those rules posted there. Each agency vehicle,
25 with the exception of a vehicle assigned to a field
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1 employee, shall be assigned to an agency motor pool. And
2 that motor pool, of course, will be headed out of here.
3 The vehicles in that motor pool would be available for
4 checkout.
5 The agency may assign a vehicle to an
6 administrative person or an executive employee here on a
7 regular basis only if the agency makes a written
8 documented finding that the assignment is critical to the
9 needs of the agency.
10 So those are the two basic rules that we are all
11 having to present to our commissions and have adopted for
12 your consideration.
13 If you have any questions, I would be glad to
14 address them.
15 COMMISSIONER WATSON: Bob, at one of the
16 earlier -- I guess it was Senate Finance meetings that we
17 attended, Senator Lucio, I remember specifically, raised a
18 number of issues, questions with the Department relative
19 to its numbers of vehicles -- vehicle usages.
20 Has any of that crept into anything that's here?
21 MR. ROBERT COOK: Not really. You know,
22 most of the concerns that we hear at the legislature deal
23 almost specifically, almost exclusively, totally with the
24 vehicles here in Austin; very little to do with the fleet
25 scattered across the state that our field employees use on
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1 a regular basis.
2 This plan, one which I might add we had already
3 been addressing and dealing with, primarily focuses on
4 those fleets of vehicles here in Austin. And it will
5 impact us some here. It will affect us a little bit. I
6 believe it will address the concerns expressed by the
7 Senator and by a few others in the legislature. It should
8 resolve those issues for their satisfaction.
9 COMMISSIONER ANGELO: Any other questions?
10 All right.
11 Hearing none -- this is an action item. And
12 with no objection, we'll place it on the agenda tomorrow
13 for public discussion and action. Hearing none --
14 MR. ROBERT COOK: Thank you, sir.
15 COMMISSIONER ANGELO: -- it will be done.
16 Item No. 7, another action item with regard to
17 local park funding. Tim Hogsett will discuss the Urban
18 Park and Recreation Recovery Act. Tim?
19 ACTION ITEM NO. 7 - LOCAL PARK FUNDING
20 MR. TIM HOGSETT: Thank you, Mr. Chairman
21 and members of the Commission.
22 I'm Tim Hogsett, Director of the Recreation
23 Grants Program in the State Parks Division. I'm going to
24 talk to you today a little about the Urban Parks and
25 Recreation Recovery Program. This is a grant program that
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1 is administered by the U.S. Department of Interior and
2 National Parks Service.
3 The UPRR program essentially makes grants
4 available from the park service for parks and recreation
5 communities that have parks and recreation facilities,
6 primarily the urban facilities and for the rehabilitation
7 of facilities that are, for whatever reason, no longer
8 usable.
9 The federal government makes the funding
10 decisions. It's based on a national competition. All
11 parks and recreation departments, communities are eligible
12 to submit applications if they have what's called a
13 recovery actino plan that's been approved by the National
14 Parks Service.
15 It is a matching grant program with a 70 percent
16 federal share being available, and the additional
17 30 percent can be made either strictly through a local
18 contribution or a combination of a local and state
19 contribution. Basically, what happens is -- is if the
20 Commission determines that Texas applicants should be
21 supported through part of our program through the local
22 park fund, then up to 15 percent of that local share can
23 be taken over by state contributions.
24 If the -- if we do make a contribution using the
25 Texas Recreation and Parks account, it will make Texas
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1 applications more competitive in the national competition.
2 There is $28 million available for this national
3 competition of which no state is eligible for more than 15
4 percent, and that works out to be approximately $4.3
5 million available for Texas projects.
6 In the past, past Commissions have agreed to
7 participate at a ten percent match level. That would
8 essentially, then, leave a ten percent share that would be
9 required of the local governments of their contribution.
10 And, basically, the rationale in the past for that has
11 been that there really needs to be a local commitment and
12 it not be a complete 100 percent state and local -- I'm
13 sorry, state and federal commitment of resources.
14 At 10 percent, we would set aside and request
15 that you consider setting aside $432,540 from the Texas
16 Recreation and Parks Account. That would be the maximum
17 commitment. If Texas applicants were not -- some of them
18 were not successful and we did not end up receiving the
19 $4.3 million collectively, then any of that unused State
20 fund would go back into out normal grant -- State outdoor
21 grant program.
22 And I would be glad to answer any questions that
23 you might have.
24 COMMISSIONER ANGELO: Are there any
25 questions?
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1 COMMISSIONER AVILA: Is that an annual
2 award?
3 MR. TIM HOGSETT: This is the first time
4 that this program's been available for several years.
5 Each year Congress considers it, but it has not been --
6 funds have not be appropriated for the last several years.
7 COMMISSIONER AVILA: But the period of time
8 for respondents is going to be what, over what period, a
9 year or more?
10 MR. TIM HOGSETT: They will -- you mean how
11 long they will have to accomplish the project? They will
12 have up to the five years.
13 COMMISSIONER AVILA: But to apply for it.
14 MR. TIM HOGSETT: And the application
15 deadline is June the 18th. So they need -- if -- if, as
16 part of the scoring process, they're going to get
17 additional priority for Parks and Wildlife's participation
18 they need to know that so they can get that additional
19 credit.
20 COMMISSIONER ANGELO: Obviously, they have
21 been well aware of their application process?
22 MR. TIM HOGSETT: Yes. In fact, the
23 National Parks Service came and in this room had two
24 workshops that were well attended by local governments.
25 MR. SANSOM: And this is -- this action
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1 would be very supported by local government in Texas.
2 COMMISSIONER WATSON: You mentioned 70
3 percent, 10 percent and 10 percent. Where's the other 10
4 percent?
5 MR. TIM HOGSETT: 70 percent is the minimum
6 federal share that the federal government will make
7 available. That leaves 30 percent.
8 If the local -- if the state governments provide
9 a dollar for each dollar that's provided, up to 15 percent
10 will be matched by an increase in that federal share. So
11 a -- if we participate at 15 percent, then essentially
12 it's 15 percent -- it's, what, 85 percent federal and 15
13 percent state. And what we're asking you to consider
14 doing is only provide a ten percent share which would then
15 increase the federal share to 80 percent and then leave a
16 ten percent share for the local governments to have to
17 commit.
18 MS. DINKINS: Tim, how many communities
19 participate and what sorts of parks?
20 MR. TIM HOGSETT: In the last -- the last
21 time we received applications, they were primarily the
22 large cities. Houston received a grant.
23 CHAIRMAN BASS: Aging facilities.
24 MR. TIM HOGSETT: It's aging facilities
25 Aging outdoor recreation facilities, typically in the
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1 inner city.
2 One of the things that the fellow from the Parks
3 Service said when he was here is that many of these parks
4 are in war zones, basically. They are really in bad
5 shape, and they've got to have rehabilitation or they're
6 going to be lost.
7 COMMISSIONER ANGELO: Any other questions
8 or discussion?
9 Again, this an action item and, with no
10 objection, will be placed on the agenda for public
11 discussion and action by the Commission.
12 Hearing none, it will be done so. And we have
13 now Item 8, which is other business. And I believe Andy
14 has something.
15 ITEM 8 - OTHER BUSINESS
16 MR. SANSOM: Just a couple of final
17 comments, members.
18 I have caught Dee Skelton in the process of
19 running an errand, which she does at all -- all during
20 these meetings, and could not pass the opportunity to tell
21 you that Dee is an important part of this legislative
22 process, as well.
23 We probably look at several thousand pieces of
24 information place to determine how they're going to affect
25 the Department or its mission. And Dee is the person who
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1 is in charge of making sure that that piece of legislation
2 gets to the officer in the Department who's been assigned
3 to review it and then get that analysis back and up to the
4 Capital. So she's been a critical part of this process,
5 as well.
6 I also want to just take a moment and say that
7 we went over Sunset a little quickly. Sunset is going to
8 be a big deal for us. We've got basically less than the
9 full biennium to report back to the legislature on
10 implementing all of the new tasks that the Sunset bill has
11 given us. And I fully anticipate that, once again, by the
12 time we reconvene in August, we're going to lay in front
13 of you an action plan to get all of those things put into
14 place. And they're going to have to do everything from
15 creating essentially a master land and water conservation
16 plan for the whole state to changing the way that you do
17 business here in these meetings. And I'm confident that
18 that process will be ably coordinated by Gene McCarty.
19 I will tell you that throughout this Sunset
20 issue, Gene has been the person who has taken it from the
21 points in time that the Sunset staff first began to
22 interview and perform analysis in the Department through
23 the process of the Commission hearings and the legislative
24 process itself. And he's done a wonderful job of it. And
25 I fully anticipate giving him the charge to take it this
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1 final step over the goal line. So thank you, Gene.
2 And that concludes my remarks.
3 COMMISSIONER ANGELO: Are there any
4 other -- any other items to be discussed?
5 If not, Mr. Chairman, that concludes the Finance
6 Committee meeting.
7 CHAIRMAN BASS: Thank you.
8 At this time I would like to announce that
9 pursuant to requirements of Chapter 551, referred to as
10 the Open Meetings Act, the Executive Session will be held
11 for purpose of consideration of land transactions and we
12 will reconvene in this room after that. Thank you.
13 (Meeting adjourned at 12:26 p.m.)
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1 STATE OF TEXAS )
2 COUNTY OF TRAVIS)
3 REPORTER'S CERTIFICATION
4 I, Rhonda Howard, Certified Shorthand Reporter in
5 and for the State of Texas, hereby certify that on May 30,
6 2000, I was present at the Texas Parks and Wildlife
7 Commission for committee meetings and that this is a true
8 and complete transcript of the proceedings.
9 I further certify that the proceedings were put
10 into writing by myself with the help of Lori Estrada of
11 the TEXAS PARKS AND WILDLIFE COMMISSION.
12 I further certify that I am neither counsel for,
13 related to, nor employed by any of the parties or
14 attorneys in the action in which this proceeding was
15 taken, and further that I am not financially or otherwise
16 interested in the outcome of the action.
17 Certified to by me, this 28th day of June,
18 2001.
19 _____________________________________
20 ____________________________
RHONDA HOWARD, Texas CSR No. 4136
21 Expiration Date 12/31/02
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