Lawmakers prepare bills for January

This past Monday, November 10, 2008, was the first day that lawmakers were able to file bills that will be debated in the legislative session this coming January. The state of Texas is more financially able than many other states, but due to a few certain issues such as Hurricane Ike funds and the federal-state health insurance program, the budget is limited so the bills passed must be taken into great consideration finance-wise. A few of these proposed bills are giving insight as to what lawmakers will be possibly passing.

One of Senator Jane Nelson's propositions is turning fingerprint-based background checks into a requirement for those who will be working at nursing homes or with those who are mentally ill. She believes that technology should be taken advantage of and that using fingerprints would be a suitable replacement for just the original criminal background checks which may overlook important criminal history.

Senator Bob Deuell has proposed that some children ought to be able to use Medicaid, with the condition that their parents must pay a premium. This bill would be proactive because currently, only families that have a limited amount of income are able to qualify, and now parents will be able to obtain better jobs without having to worry about completely losing their children's insurance.

A final bill proposal by Senator Dan Patrick will require all women to have an ultrasound before they can have an abortion. Patrick's main hope is that women will see the image of the baby and choose to carry through with their pregnancies-whether it results in adoption or raising the child themselves. This is not the first bill related to the topic of abortion to be proposed; last year the Senate passed a similar one but never made it through the House.

At this point, Republicans outnumber the amount of Democrats-more specifically 76 to 74-but even after ballots have been counted, there are still speculations on whether these numbers are accurate. With Democrats filling the seats, there is the chance that some of these proposed bills will not have much hope in being passed.

Such proposals concerning very fragile topics such as abortion will be likely to cause heated debates not only in the legislative session, but amongst taxpayers who would be made to pay higher taxes for something they may strongly oppose.