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ARCHIVE
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Issue 4
April 5, 2007
Vol. 1
Issue 4
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Issue 3
March 30, 2007
Vol. 1
Issue 3
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Issue 2
March 23, 2007
Vol. 1
Issue 2
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Issue 1
March 9, 2007
Vol. 2007
Issue 1
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Advocacy
 Our thanks go to everyone who has personally written to their legislators, thanking them for their ongoing support for DCCCD and community colleges in general. In order for us to remain on legislators’ radar screens, they must hear directly from each of our DCCCD advocates.
We continue to make enhancements to the governmental affairs page on our Web site. Please visit our website for additional information about how to contact your legislators. Thanks for doing your part to support our legislative activities.
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Appropriations
After a great deal of discussion, yesterday the Senate approved its version of the appropriations bill. The current bill would provide approximately $120 million for community colleges, which translates into $3.8 million in additional dollars for DCCCD.
Now the budget discussion moves to the conference committee, which will hash out the differences between the House and Senate versions. We anticipate that appointments to the conference committee will be announced early next wee k; then the committee will move quickly to get its work done.
The other bit of budget news from Austin this week is related to the $700 million Frew Medicaid settlement that was negotiated. Rather than fund this settlement from the state’s surplus, the legislature decided to institute an across-the-board budget cut of .59 percent.
Although we expect to see some additional funding freed up later during the session, we do not anticipate any significant additions to our allocation.
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Committee Meetings
 Much of the higher education-related discussion this week was related to the 10 percent rule and tuition increases. However, several bills were heard that are of interest to DCCCD, including:
SB 1064, which addresses community college purchasing provisions, was approved by the Senate Education Committee and now moves to the full Senate. Purchasing director Philip Todd and DCCCD staff were at the committee meeting to support the bill. [Read about the bill]
HB 956 is one of the bills that seeks to reduce the cost of textbooks. DCCCD testified about this bill last month, and its author has worked with DCCCD staff to improve it. The result was a new amendment to the bill that was presented this week to the House Higher Education Committee; it is pending in committee for more changes. [Read about the bill]
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Legislation
A few upcoming bills that are of particular interest to DCCCD are HB 3828, HB 3450 and HB 3443.
HB 3828 is part of Governor Perry’s incentive funding provisions. [Read the bill]
HB 3450 is a bill which focuses on measuring academic success and also would create a n academic planning Web site. We will seek to improve this bill because it contains some provisions that would be confusing to implement. [Read the bill]
HB 3443 is related to the creation of the Texas Hospital-Based Nursing Education Partnership Grant Program. This bill could provide significant benefits to our nursing programs. [Read the bill]
We continue to track and analyze proposed bills that may affect the Dallas County Community College District. You can see the updated tracking list and bill status on the DCCCD Web site.
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