It was almost different and then it wasn’t, but it still could be.
Rep. Chris Paddie
Paid ride companies such as Uber and Lyft are one step closer to the statewide oversight they crave, after a state Senate committee approved a revised plan to regulate them, as opposed to cities.
Members of the Senate State Affairs committee approved the bill, unchanged from what was sent by House lawmakers in HB 100, sponsored by State Rep, Chris Paddie, R-Marshall. The bill establishes statewide rules for paid ride companies that connect willing drivers and interested riders by smartphone. State rules would eliminate any city regulations, while still giving cities control to regulate taxi and limousine drivers and companies.
State Sen. Charles Schwertner, R-Georgetown, at first proffered a substituted version of the bill, then rescinded the substitute without discussion so the committee could approve the original version.
“Several senators expressed a desire to offer additional changes to HB 100,” said Thomas Halloway, chief of staff for Schwertner, in an email. “In the interest of moving the legislation forward, we agreed the most appropriate action was to move the original bill to the floor so all senators have the opportunity to offer their own thoughts.”
As a result, the bill the senate will consider retains a clause added by House lawmakers that defines sex as “the physical condition of being male or female.”
See here and here for some background. Sen. Schwertner had originally stripped that bad amendment out of the bill, so I am hopeful that it will get amended out on the floor of the Senate. We’ll see.
I want my Tx senator Borris Miles to yes Vote the statewide ride share,we have been getting jumped on down here by our a campaign money loving Mayor, Sylvester Turner,he’s tried to jump on houstonians with inhumane taxi medallions in a limited capacity, he’s taking more Texas big taxi campaign funds then all previous Houston Mayors combined, Turner is factually presiding over the most corrupt taxi medallion system globally, Houston is desperate for state wide Ride share and desperate to get this thing out of Sylvester Turners hands,he has no regard when it comes to fair market free transportation for our students,our community and our citizens and he’s demonstrated this by tackling down on the locked taxi medallion limit system the citizens are running from.Texas Senator Borris miles ,help us get this ride share away from Turner,ASAP for gods sake this man has a vision to nowhere in hired transportation in houston and its costing houstonians millions in extra fees per year.#helpusmiles #turnerslost #visiontoniwhere #chron
The obvious question is, are we for local control or not? The other question is, should all livery services be regulated equally, or is it best to have one set of rules for some, other rules for others?
Being a libertarian, it seems like all livery services should be regulated the same. To do otherwise becomes unequal treatment under the law. And Joshua, of course you are right, artificially limiting entry in to any business is wrong. Anyone who can follow the rules should be allowed to run a taxi. As to the local control issue, I’d say the deciding factor would be, which governmental entity is affording the most freedom to the citizenry. The win should always go to the citizens.