Sec. 2008.057. CONFIDENTIALITY OF CERTAIN RECORDS AND COMMUNICATIONS

(a) Sections 154.053 and 154.073, Civil Practice and Remedies Code, apply to the communications, records, conduct, and demeanor of the facilitator and the members of the negotiated rulemaking committee as if the negotiated rulemaking were a dispute being resolved in accordance with Chapter 154, Civil Practice and Remedies Code.

(b) In the negotiated rulemaking context the attorney general, subject to review by a Travis County district court, decides in accordance with Section 154.073(d), Civil Practice and Remedies Code, whether a communication or material subject to Section 154.073(d) is confidential, excepted from required disclosure, or subject to required disclosure.

(c) Notwithstanding Section 154.073(e), Civil Practice and Remedies Code:

(1) a private communication and a record of a private communication between a facilitator and a member or members of the committee are confidential and may not be disclosed unless the member or members of the committee, as appropriate, consent to the disclosure; and

(2) the notes of a facilitator are confidential except to the extent that the notes consist of a record of a communication with a member of the committee who has consented to disclosure in accordance with Subdivision (1).

(d) The report and recommendations of a convener and a negotiating committee are public information and available on request to any member of the public.

Added by Acts 1997, 75th Leg., ch. 1315, Sec. 1, eff. Sept. 1, 1997. Amended by Acts 1999, 76th Leg., ch. 1352, Sec. 4, eff. Sept. 1, 1999.