What is TLO?

Texas Legislature Online (TLO) – capitol.texas.gov
TLO enables the public to view the status of legislation and to search bill text, amendment text, and bill information.

Finding a Specific Piece of Legislation

• If you know the bill number:
  • On the TLO homepage, use the “Search Legislation” feature
  • “Word/Phrase” will automatically be selected, switch the toggle to “Bill Number”
  • Enter the bill number, including the applicable chamber. Ex. HB 151, SB 32
    • The syntax for the bill number should be:  CHAMBER    BILL TYPE    BILL SUFFIX
      • CHAMBER = H (House) or S (Senate)
      • BILL TYPE = B (Bill), R (Resolution), JR (Joint Resolution), CR (Concurrent Resolution)
      • BILL SUFFIX = Up to 5-digit number
• If you don’t know the bill number:
  • On the TLO homepage, use the “Search Legislation” feature
  • “Word/Phrase” will automatically be selected
  • Enter the word or phrase you are searching. Ex. School finance

Researching Legislation by a Specific Member

• On the TLO homepage, hover over the “House” tab
• Click “Members” and find the Member you are looking for
• On the Member’s page, scroll down to “Legislative Information”
  • Here you can search by bills authored, coauthored, sponsored, etc.
  • Within each link you’ll find the total number of bills authored, and can read the caption, last action (or the most recent step a bill has undergone in the legislative process), and be re-directed to each bill’s history page.

Researching Bills by Subject, Committee, etc.

• On the TLO homepage, find “Additional Searches”
• Click “Bill Search”
• Select the applicable Legislative Session, Chamber, and Bill Type
• Select the applicable Author and/or Sponsor
  • House members appear before Senate members in the drop down bar
• Select the “Type” of authorship and/or sponsorship you’d like to search
• If searching for bills by subject matter, click “Select subject criteria”
  • Searchable by various issues.
• If searching for bills from a specific committee, click “Committee”
  • Be sure to designate if you’d like to search bills in committee, out of committee, or both.
• If searching for bills by legislative actions, click “Actions”
  • Common actions include: Effective immediately, Effective in 90 days, Sent to the Governor, Signed by the Governor, Vetoed by the Governor, etc.

Helpful Sites to Know

Texas Constitution and Statues (TCAS) – statutes.capitol.texas.gov
Here you can research statutes and read codes in full.

Legislative Reference Library (LRL) – lrl.texas.gov
Earlier legislative history can be found on LRL, as well as daily news clips related to the legislature and its members.

Texas Ethics Commission (TEC) – ethics.state.tx.us
Research campaign finance reports, delve into election law, and find information on how to make an open records request for certain financial documents, etc.