ContentsIntroduction
Introduction GG 1 Streamline the Tax Reporting and Auditing Process for Texas Businesses GG 2 Increase Use of Innovative Highway Construction Financing Options GG 3 Lease Rights-of-Way Along Texas Highways GG 4 Improve Marketing of Special License Plates GG 5 Remove Brush to Conserve Water GG 6 Lease or Sell Underused State Lands GG 7 Privatize Overpayment Collections Function GG 8 Reduce Lottery Reserve to Save Taxpayer Dollars GG 9 Expand the Use of Private Adoption Agencies GG 10 Increase Child Support Payments with Enhanced Court Oversight GG 11 Improve Efforts to Find Parents and Increase Child Support Collections on Foster Care Cases GG 12 Create a "Virtual University" for Local Officials in Rural Areas GG 13 Improve Internet Access in Rural Communities GG 14 Permit College Students in the Military an Alternative to State Exams GG 15 Expand the Use of Desalination to Provide Water for Texans
The general government function includes the state's executive and administrative agencies, legislative agencies, and judicial functions. This chapter provides proposals that could ensure that state government receives the best returns on public assets; improves the lives of children in state care; and provides solutions to the special problems of rural Texans.
One proposal would streamline the audit process for businesses and the Comptroller's office by amending the Texas Tax Code to allow managed self-audits, which allow businesses to sample invoices selected by the Comptroller's office, assess their tax responsibilities based on that sample, and receive waivers of penalties or interest for participating. The code also should be amended to allow percentage-based reporting, which allows a business to review and sample a percentage of invoices to calculate their tax liability for reporting purposes, instead of having to account for the taxability of every invoice. Moreover, businesses should be allowed to substantiate their case for a tax refund using an approved sampling method.
With the increased demand for wireless communications and other new communications technologies, the state stands to gain from the wise use of assets held by the Texas Department of Transportation (TxDOT), including utility poles and road medians. Other states have benefited from leasing poles and medians to interested communications companies; TxDOT should move forward quickly in responding to requests from companies to lease these assets and, moreover, should aggressively advertise their availability. Similarly, TxDOT should consider using innovative techniques to finance road projects, such as grant anticipation revenue vehicles and performance-based pavement warranties.
TxDOT controls yet another potentially valuable asset, specialty license plates. Texas sold more than 100,000 specialty plates last year, generating $3.1 million in fees. However, these are rather small figures considering that Texas has 16 million registered vehicles on its roads. In many states, specialty plates are used to raise money for special causes such as scholarships for colleges. Virginia makes about $11 million on its specialty plates each year, even though the state has only a third as many registered vehicles as does Texas. To improve the sales of Texas' specialty plates, this chapter proposes that TxDOT insert a brochure in vehicle license renewals to increase public awareness of the availability of these plates.
Texas owns 873,000 acres of land in addition to the lands managed by the Permanent School Fund and General Land Office. Much of this land is underused and could provide a substantially better return for the taxpayers. This chapter recommends that a portion of the state's underused lands be sold or leased over the next five years. Another proposal would strengthen reporting requirements so that the state can better account for its assets.
Another valuable asset in Texas is the large presence of the armed forces. In 1997, the armed forces employed about 111,000 military personnel in Texas, a larger military presence than any other state's except California and Virginia. About 33,100 of these persons were enrolled in higher education institutions across the state. The Texas Academic Skills Program is intended to ensure that students really are ready for college-level work. However, military students already take a similar test, the Armed Services Vocational Aptitude Battery (ASVAB). Texas should eliminate duplicative testing and exempt military personnel from the TASP test, while granting the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board authority to determine acceptable ASVAB scores.
Nearly a third of the state's youngest children live in poverty and child support is an important factor in improving their lives. Texas should create child support court monitors who would track cases involving individuals on probation for noncompliance with child support orders. Furthermore, the Office of Court Administration should implement a court monitoring project similar to a pilot program in Texas' Third Administrative Judicial Region that boosted child support collections by 74 percent. In addition, the Texas Workforce Commission (TWC) should be required to conduct job training and referral programs for persons who are delinquent in child support payments, since many of them become delinquent due to unemployment. TWC also should improve the state's recovery of Unemployment Insurance benefit overpayments by seeking competitive bids for this service from the public and private sectors.
In 1997, 1,886 foster care children were free to be adopted but not yet placed in adoptive homes. These children waited an average of 16.5 months to be adopted, even though half already had permanent placements identified. This chapter recommends that the Department of Protective and Regulatory Services (DPRS) make greater use of private adoption agencies and initiate a statewide effort to increase the number of potential adoptive families. It also proposes modifications to state adoption law and policy to ensure that children in foster care complete high school and that DPRS share some of the risk of parents who adopt children with special needs. Still another proposal would establish a work group of state health and human service agencies and the Office of Attorney General to share data and resources to locate the parents or relatives of children in state care, obtain child support, establish paternity, and maximize federal funding for all functions.
Many rural areas of Texas are semi-arid and face significant water problems. These problems are exacerbated by Texas scrub plants such as mesquite, juniper, and cactus, which consume about 10 million acre feet of water every year--roughly two-thirds of the state's human consumption. This chapter discusses how desalination plants and brush control can improve the availability of drinking water across the state. The Texas Water Development Board should work with communities and government agencies to determine the best water recovery projects and methods for each area, with an emphasis on desalination where practicable. Moreover, the state should invest in programs to manage thirsty brush and dramatically reduce downstream runoff.
Many rural community officials are volunteers and cannot travel long distances to attend training sessions or seek help in complying with state and federal requirements. This chapter outlines ways in which rural officials can be linked with the expertise they need to solve their communities' problems. In many cases, for instance, high-quality Internet access is too expensive for rural citizens, yet the Internet holds enormous potential for improving their business and government operations. Public schools, libraries, and hospitals receive grants to construct high-quality, high-speed Internet conduits, but under current state law they cannot make their unused capacity available to local Internet service providers. This obstacle should be removed for rural communities. Furthermore, this report recommends the creation of a pilot project to test the feasibility of a "virtual university" for rural officials that would provide training and expertise via the Internet.
In all, this report's recommendations for general government could result in a gain to state government of $793.0 million over the next five years.