Governor Perry officially broke out his veto pen yesterday.
Gov. Rick Perry made his final rulings Friday on legislation approved by Texas lawmakers, vetoing 49 bills that came out of the five-month session.
The Republican governor had until Sunday to decide whether to sign or veto bills, but he planned to get it all done before the weekend.
On Friday, Perry announced he’d signed the 2008-09 state budget into law, allocating $151.9 billion for state programs. He used his line-item veto power to get rid of $570 million from the budget that lawmakers passed.
Vetoing bills from Democrats and Republicans alike, Perry used his veto pen on some legislation before the 140-day session ended May 28 and announced Friday he was striking down dozens of other bills.
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Perry set the known record for vetoes by a Texas governor in 2001 with 83, according to the Texas Legislative Reference Library. That was shortly after he ascended to the governorship in December 2000, once fellow Republican George W. Bush resigned to become president.
Bush had far fewer vetoes during his tenure as governor. His highest total for a legislative session was 38 in 1997.
Here’s the complete list of vetoed bills. I don’t see any new ones on that list that stand out to me, but there’s a lot of bills that get passed, and I can only follow so many. Anything there that outrages you? Let me know.
The very good news, as Pete happily notes, is that HB1919 got signed into law. Take that, TAB! This is very good news for many families across Texas today. My thanks to everyone who contacted their state rep to help push this through or the Governor to urge him to sign it. Y’all done good.
Two of the vetoes are HB4091 and HB4113, which would have created a management district that covers all of Montrose, just like Midtown and Upper Kirby have managment districts. Management districts (if well-governed) can be a really useful way to do street improvements paid for by local commercial landowners, and there was a lot of local support for this one. A similar bill almost passed in 2003 but was blocked by Martha Wong.
Background:
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/nb/heights/news/4863546.html