BILL ANALYSIS

C.S.H.B. 2484

By: Guillen

Public Education

Committee Report (Substituted)

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE

Under current law, there is no required protection of the safety of a referee, judge, or administrator at a public school athletic event. There is also a lack of regulation of conduct by a spectator related to those officials' safety. C.S.H.B. 2484 seeks to address these safety concerns by providing for a spectator's prohibited attendance of any future activity sponsored or sanctioned by a public school district or the University Interscholastic League if the spectator engages in specified injurious conduct against a person serving as an official of the applicable activity. The bill also requires the provision of a peace officer, school resource officer, administrator, or security personnel to ensure the safety of such an official under certain circumstances.

CRIMINAL JUSTICE IMPACT

It is the committee's opinion that this bill does not expressly create a criminal offense, increase the punishment for an existing criminal offense or category of offenses, or change the eligibility of a person for community supervision, parole, or mandatory supervision.

RULEMAKING AUTHORITY

It is the committee's opinion that this bill does not expressly grant any additional rulemaking authority to a state officer, department, agency, or institution.

ANALYSIS

C.S.H.B. 2484 amends the Education Code to require a spectator of a University Interscholastic League (UIL) competition, including a student participant's parent or guardian, to be prohibited from attending any future extracurricular activity sponsored or sanctioned by a public school district or UIL if the spectator engages in conduct that intentionally, knowingly, or recklessly causes bodily injury to a person serving as referee, judge, or other official of an extracurricular activity in retaliation for or as a result of the person's actions taken in performing their duties as such an official. The bill establishes that an appeal to the commissioner of education is not a contested case under the Administrative Procedure Act if the issues presented relate to a spectator's eligibility to attend an extracurricular activity based on such misconduct.

C.S.H.B. 2484 requires a district or open-enrollment charter school that holds an extracurricular athletic activity or a UIL athletic competition on district or charter school property to provide a peace officer, school resource officer, administrator, or security personnel to ensure the safety of a referee, judge, or other official of the activity or competition until the official departs district or charter school property under either of the following circumstances:

·         a participant or spectator of the activity or competition engages in, attempts to engage in, or threatens violent conduct against the official or otherwise disrupts the official's duties or free movement; or

·         the district or charter school reasonably suspects that such an incident may occur at the activity or competition.

The bill's provisions apply beginning with the 2023-2024 school year.

EFFECTIVE DATE

On passage, or, if the bill does not receive the necessary vote, September 1, 2023.

COMPARISON OF INTRODUCED AND SUBSTITUTE

While C.S.H.B. 2484 may differ from the introduced in minor or nonsubstantive ways, the following summarizes the substantial differences between the introduced and committee substitute versions of the bill.

Unlike the introduced, the substitute includes an administrator among the individuals that may be provided to satisfy the bill's requirement for a district or charter school to do so for purposes of ensuring the safety of the official of the applicable activity or competition. The substitute also includes a specification not present in the introduced that the extracurricular activity or UIL competition held on district or charter school property to which such a requirement applies is an extracurricular athletic activity or UIL athletic competition.